


Time to toss the dice

by isabilightwood



Series: there are no endings, only new beginnings [4]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, F/M, Gen, Minor Character Death, Padmé Amidala Lives, Parallel Universes, Satine Kryze Lives, Time Travel, and relationship important, but were/are also just fun to write, they are plot important, this installment is a series of connected one shots
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:35:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 56,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24051427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isabilightwood/pseuds/isabilightwood
Summary: In an parallel universe, Ahsoka Tano was executed for the Jedi Temple Bombing, Anakin Skywalker fell, and an Empire rose early. The Ahsoka we know stepped out of the World Between Worlds and into a different past. There are a few more Jedi left in the Galaxy, but the Empire won't fall in a day. Or even a year.A continuation of the story that began inOne Door Closes Another Opens
Relationships: CT-7567 | Rex/Ahsoka Tano, Kaeden Larte/Riyu Chuchi, Leia Organa & Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan Kenobi/Satine Kryze, Padmé Amidala & Ahsoka Tano
Series: there are no endings, only new beginnings [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/983994
Comments: 51
Kudos: 140





	1. What to Do When The Empire Kidnaps Your Husband

**Author's Note:**

> A little different from the previous three installments. These chapters contain some actual plot, both with Ahsoka, Obi-wan and co, and other parts of the galaxy where the shockwaves of the AU have reached. But also some fluff. And I mean the romantic relationship tags this time.
> 
> Chapter 1 is a brief AU of Catalyst: A Rogue One novel. It's also probably the only time I'll attempt Palpatine's perspective.
> 
> This is unbeta-d because my usual beta is an ICU nurse and she is Very Stressed right now, so please forgive any extra typos.

_0 AFE, Coruscant: In the Hours after Order 66, at the Crowning of Emperor Palpatine_

In the moment of his triumph, hailed by the thunderous applause of the thousands of sheep who thought themselves the masters of the universe, the newly declared Emperor Palpatine felt a shift in the force. 

A stutter, a blink, a whisper. A message there and gone in a second: beware, ye who would become a god, for giants may be slain and temples crumble into ruin.

The smile on his face as he waved to the crowd did not falter. Even the hovering bots recording his speech would find not the slightest tremor. Nothing would diminish this victorious day he had so long awaited. Not even the arrival of a new knight on the light side of the board, a shift in the weight on blind Justice’s scales, tilting the force ever so slightly back towards the light.

He smiled and waved, displaying the regal visage and bearing of the Galaxy’s long awaited Supreme Emperor to its people. All the sheep, so grateful at the prospect of an end to the war they would not notice that in the transition from corrupt Republic to stable Empire their cherished freedoms had been stolen. Until far too late. His smile was genuine.

It was only later that the Emperor sought answers in the footage of the downfall of his ancient enemy, the Jedi Order. His old, faithful assistant in the search for eternity, Hydan, scrolled through scene after scene as Sidious watched, absorbed in the orchestral crescendo set to accompany the images. There pedantic Plo-koon who risked himself for the sake of a few insignificant clones was shot down by his own men, there credulous Aayla Secura succumbed to rapid fire to the back. There, too few bodies of younglings lay in the rubble.

As he watched Yoda meet his end as others escaped with the younglings, the discrepancy he had felt dawned on him.

He waved for Hydan to rewind the recording to an earlier scene, where a young Togruta Jedi with impossibly white sabers turned to face her betrayers.

_Tano._

The notes of the triumphant final suite from the once-banned ballet “Vengeance of Darth Bane” soured.

The image was blurry, but the markings on the Togruta Jedi were unmistakably those of his apprentice’s infuriating Padawan. Impossible. The girl had been executed in front of him only hours earlier. 

Unless. 

The ancient Sith texts spoke in cryptic verse of travelers from other worlds, and other times, sent through portals found only in a temple lost to the ages. 

This Tano was older, a woman not a girl, stretched into adulthood in a way Skywalker’s poor little apprentice never would. She moved with the assuredness of decades. This was Tano, and yet not.

The proof before him was undeniable.

Could this be the path to immortality, to an Empire that lasted for eternity, that Sidious had sought for so long? Not the Sith Temple buried beneath the blood-splattered mass grave of the Jedi Temple. Rather this mere Jedi who shouldn’t exist?

One thing was certain. His apprentice could not be permitted to learn of Tano’s existence. Sidious had seized the opportunity to push Anakin Skywalker over the edge into the Dark Side when it presented itself, moving his plans ahead by several months. Unfortunately, not only had both Kenobi and Amidala managed to escape his clutches, Kenobi’s absence had prevented him from fully destroying his apprentice’s ties to the light. Learning of this other Tano’s existence could ruin his plans for Darth Vader. None other could provide the challenge of this carefully cultivated apprentice. 

No, if Lord Vader were ever to learn of Tano, it must be under controlled circumstances, circumstances that would destroy the pedestal in his mind built to her memory, and his residual longing for brother and wife, in the same blow. He would consider this for the future. For now, he would keep her image from the wanted lists, allow her to think herself undetected. He would create his devoted Hydan a minister, and he would divert his research to include tracking Tano. In time, she would lead him to the Ones, and immortality. 

Or so he thought, at first.

Until a report came in: missing kyber crystals, a star destroyer captain’s data stolen from under his nose. A conscripted geoengineer gone missing en route to Coruscant. A hundred or a thousand little gadfly bites, not enough to tip his hand, but a tip off that someone knew one of the cards.

There was a common denominator. A few of the incidents, a glimpse of a fraction of a familiar face, always shrouded under a gray hood.

From wherever and whenever Tano had been sent, the Jedi must have prior knowledge of his ultimate weapon. 

It would be so easy to crush her under his thumb, unaware as she seemed of his monitoring. She was merely one Jedi, incapable of matching his genius.

True, he was unable to find her base of operations, off on some measly rock in uncharted space. But she surfaced often enough for assassination to be a simple matter. It would solve many of his problems, wipe out much of the fledgling resistance to his power in one move.

Yet... only she could lead him to the lost Temple of the Ones.

And if his agents failed, she would know he deemed her a threat. A cockroach, that one, with a talent for evading her fate even after it was delivered.

No, he would simply need to increase security, move the remaining off-site operations to the battle station earlier than planned. He summoned the groveling fool overseeing construction to his throne room and turned his thoughts to the problem of his Apprentice.

_1 AFE, Coruscant: An Empty Apartment, a month after the conscription of all engineers knowingly or unknowingly working on Project Stardust_

Lyra juggled her daughter and her bags as she scrambled to find her apartment key in the handbag she hadn’t touched in months. Jyn nuzzled into her shoulder, on the verge of wailing again, discomfited by the unfamiliar sounds of Coruscant’s constant bustle. Her hand shook, and her stomach churned at the memory of the devastated ecological paradises Has Obitt, smuggler and watchdog, had taken her to witness on her way back from Alpinn, and Lyra thanked her stars her own expedition had failed, finding ranite in the place of kyber, that she was not to be the death knoll for another planet.

Her fingers brushed dull, serrated metal and caught hold before the keys had a chance to slip away among the random bits and bobs accumulated within. The lock clicked open, but the door stuck so Lyra had to apply her hip to force it open, creaking like it had forgotten its purpose as a port of entry long enough to mistake itself for a wall.

 _That couldn’t be good_ , Lyra thought, her heart picking up speed. A suspicion settled deep into her gut. She’d known Krennic wanted her out of the way when he offered her the job, wanted to take her away from her husband so his attempts to slip his hooks into the absent-minded cracks in Galen’s mind could find purpose unhindered. And she’d gone anyway, desperate for the chance to reclaim her purpose in her element. Galen was happy on Coruscant; Lyra wasn’t. She worried his work wasn’t what it seemed; he brushed off her concerns. Something had to give. So she left, hoping space and time would give him the distance to uncover the truth, hoping she was wrong.

Her fears were confirmed: Galen wasn’t home, all of his things gone, the only belongings left in the apartment cooking implements, a few summer clothes and shoes she and Jyn hadn’t needed on Alpinn.

A sheet of flimsy rested on the kitchen table, stamped with the Empire’s seal. Lyra snatched it up, attempting to set Jyn down on the table as she did, but she clung tighter. A letter, from Orson Krennic. The words blurred before her eyes. It took a few tries before she was able to read the words. Longer before she was able to comprehend it.

 _My dear Lyra,_ it read. Lyra flinched in disgust at Krennic’s audacity in addressing her that way.

_My apologies that you must learn of Galen’s transfer this way. It would have come eventually, his project is too delicate to complete outside of a specialized facility. Still, we originally planned for more of the early stages to be conducted here on Coruscant, where Galen had access to the unparalleled resource of the minds at the University. Plans changed. Galen’s research has become too sensitive to risk exposure to the inquiries of those who would seek to prevent its success. He has been relocated to a black-site facility. But never fear, Lyra, there is a place for you at the site. I will be notified by a signal placed on the door as soon as you return from Alpinn. Take an hour to pack, and I will arrive to take you and the little one to Galen._

Lyra swore, covering Jyn’s ears belatedly when she blinked up at her with innocent eyes seeking to absorb forbidden knowledge. Galen should never have accepted that position. No, that would have been impossible. What reason would Krennic have had to retrieve them from Vallt without his compliance? But they should have run early on, gone somewhere the empire could never find them. Krennic and his alluded threats and too-good-to-be-true promises be damned.

Now, Galen was gone. Taken away by Krennic, just as she had feared for so long. His optimism failed him. Why couldn’t he have just listened to her? This was what the tragedies meant by the fatal flaw of hubris.

If she only had herself to worry about, Lyra might have taken her chances with Krennic, in the hopes of being reunited with her husband, or at least taking Krennic down with her, that small cog in the machine she could reach. But there was Jyn to think about. She would not take Jyn to her death. Or worse, to grow into adulthood on some remote Imperial base, indoctrinated and alone. 

Obitt wasn’t scheduled to leave Coruscant for another two hours.

She sucked in a breath, and made her decision.

 _Goodbye, Galen._ She loved him still, but love was a complicated thing. And some sacrifices were not worth the cost.

Lyra dropped the piece of flimsy, letting it fall under the table. At first glance, it might seem as though she had missed it. That wouldn’t hold up for long, of course. But Lyra only needed long enough to get off planet, to vanish into the underworld, untraceable. She picked up her bags, still full of all the winter clothes and survey equipment that had been her trade in her much needed sabbatical on Alpinn, settled Jyn back in her sling, and left the place that had once been her home without a second glance.

She took a meandering route through the levels of Coruscant, making her way slowly, but steadily back to the spaceport where she had left her smuggler and his ship. Lyra could only hope that Krennic underestimated her and assumed she would comply with his demands without question. More importantly, that he did not know of Obitt’s betrayal. And that it was in truth a betrayal, not another of Krennic’s tricks.

When Lyra reached the spaceport, an additional security check had been implemented that hadn’t existed ninety standard minutes earlier. But all they asked for was her papers, papers to prove she was an ordinary human and not a Jedi in disguise.

She missed a message that her husband had been transfered to a different planet, she told them, when they asked her reason for departing so quickly after her arrival. Her excuse wasn’t questioned. If you didn’t have a job that required it, and weren’t a member of the wealthy class that loomed over the rest, why would anyone want to stay on Coruscant? Her husband skipped town without advance notice? Of course she wanted out!

Through customs, Lyra easily found her way back to Obitt’s ship. She knocked on the hatch, once, twice and again. Finally, Obitt opened the door, clad only in a pink and white polkadot bathrobe, his golden eyes blinking in irritated confusion. “Lyra, what...?”

“Galen’s gone. I need a ride out of here. Now.” She commanded. No less strong a demand would do to hammer in the necessity.

He nodded.“Get in.”

Too easy. She hesitated. “Can I trust you?”

His brain-shaped Dressellian head wrinkled further. “You know you can.”

“Do I?” Lyra cocked her head to the side. She knew no such thing. For all she knew, he’d been paid to show her those planets, so she would fall for his tricks and play right into Krennic’s hands. Paranoid? Maybe. But paranoia was her best bet at staying safe.

Obitt scoffed. “Why did you come here if you couldn’t?”

“What other smugglers do I know? I need you to smuggle us.” She said. He was right. It didn’t matter — she had nowhere else to go. Lyra stepped inside, and Obitt closed the door behind her, shutting her in. She dropped her bags by the entrance, and removed Jyn’s baby carrier to rest on one of the chairs. She was too big for a carrier, at two and a half, but Jyn still liked to be carried high above the ground, when she was tired or grumpy and wasn’t toddling off, babbling half-comprehensible questions at anyone who would listen.

“Last I heard, you were heading home to the husband. What changed?” Obitt leaned against the wall, crossing his arms.

She sighed. “Galen’s gone. Missing.” She explained about the note.

Obitt listened with an inscrutable expression, and when she finished all he asked was: “You want to go off grid?”

Lyra nodded. “Permanently.”

“Conveniently for you, I’m headed to meet someone who can help.” He said.

“Th-”

“Don’t thank me. It’s the least I can do. For you and little Jyn.” He drooped, less the confident smuggler than the man stuck in a situation from which it seemed impossible to win free.

Jyn startled awake at the sound of her name. “Obloobitt!” She cooed, reaching out towards him with grabby hands.

At Lyra’s nod, he scooped her up. “Hey, bit. Ready to go for an adventure?”

Jyn nodded enthusiastically, clapping her hands. She liked seeing the stars, pretty lands and curious creatures. Liked stumbling over rocks while Lyra scrambled to make sure she didn’t crack her head open. She didn’t understand that she would probably never get to know the father she already scarcely recognized. Didn’t know she might never have a stable life as they drifted in the backwaters of the galaxy. Lyra hoped the illusion would last long enough to give her a childhood.

_1 AFE, Salient System: Aboard a Partisan Ship, in the days before the willful destruction of Salient II_

“Lyra Erso, Saw Gerrera.” Obitt said, as he introduced her to a tall, armored man in the early stages of male-pattern baldness. His eyes were sad and angry, the sense of those emotions radiating out into every inch of his limbs, the hallmarks of a life destroyed by war, or oppression, or loss. Lyra might look the same to him; she certainly felt it.

“I’m told you can hide me and my daughter away from the watchful eyes of Orson Krennic.” She cut straight to the point. Gerrera seemed like a man who would appreciate frankness. “Can you? And if so, what do you want for it?”

“I could. There are plenty of planets in the galaxy.” Gerrera replied. His expression didn’t change, yet Lyra got the distinct impression he wasn’t pleased. “As for what I’d want, that depends on you. See, I owe Obitt a favor. He’s called it in. Unless you have something else to offer?”

Lyra looked out the viewing window towards a lush, green planet below. “The Empire wants this system under control because of its resources, doesn’t it? You’re organizing a resistance.”

“I’m stealing Orson Krennic’s false resistance out from under him.” Gerrera corrected her. “He sparked a rebellion so he could crush it and steal its resources. The invasion force should be arriving any day now, and they will not find anything left to use.”

“I am — I was a geological surveyor. Sound useful?” She asked.

“Could be.” He agreed, yet sounded noncommittal. “But be warned. You won’t like my methods.”

Lyra looked him over: already hardened by loss, on a quest that would never end, a rebel who would hop from cause to cause even in victory, never satisfied. A man for whom immutable lines were merely suggestions everyone else was too cowardly to cross. But then, so were his enemies. “I think I can decide that for myself.”

He searched her for uncertainty, and found none. “This planet? I’m going to ruin it for spoils from the inside out. Set it aflame until its metals are un-mineable.”

Destroying a planet to save it was, she knew, an ancient battle technique. It was still horrifying - and possibly unnecessary, at least to the degree he proposed. “What would you say if I could tell you how to wreck the planet for mining, without permanently destroying its entire ecology?”

For the first time, Gerrera looked intrigued. “I’d say that’s your ticket. And ask if you might be willing to stick around somewhere safe. Can you use a blaster? You’ll need to.”

What did he think she was, some pampered lady from Gatalenta? “I was an expedition guide for years as well as a geologic surveyor. Ran into all sorts of animals, and the occasional smuggler who wasn’t quite so friendly as Has here. I can handle a blaster.” Lyra looked down at Jyn, holding onto her hand and staring up at Gerrera with an awed expression. No sense of fear, her daughter. “But I’m not bringing my daughter into a war zone.”

“I wouldn’t ask that.” Gerrera lost himself in his memories for a moment, a wistful sorrow crossing his face. “I’ll take you to a base, and you’ll tell me how to pull this off.”

They shook on it.

“What will you do?” Lyra asked Obitt, as he gave Jyn a hug goodbye.

He flashed her a cocky grin. “You don’t have to worry about me, darling. I’m no rebel. Once I get Krennic off my back, I’m going off grid.”

It was the ‘once’ part she worried about. “You know where to find me if that doesn’t work out.”

Obitt waved in acknowledgment as he walked away. She thought it likely she’d never see him again.

Soon enough, neither would anyone else in the galaxy. At least under the name Has Obitt.

_1 AFE, Wrea: On the induction of a new official member to the terrorist group known as the Partisans_

Gerrera took her to a planet that seemed all water from space, with only tiny islands scattered across its surface that resolved into being on approach, accessible only through a dangerous course of asteroids. Jyn was instantly enamored with the gruff rebel and his driving fire, asking him a flurry of half-comprehensible questions about how his ship worked even as he narrowly dodged between densely packed deadly space rocks. It confused him greatly.

It was a safe place for Jyn to grow, this base of Saw’s. Remote, and uncharted, the perfect escape. The perfect hiding place, if Lyra wanted to stay hidden forever, or at least until someone overthrew the emperor. If that happened in her lifetime.

She did not consider that it might never happen. The force might shift in one direction, but it always, always shift back.

But Lyra did not want to stay safe, did not want to sacrifice the barest chance that she might, one day, find Galen again. Break him out of whatever facility he was hole up in, working towards the completion of some incomprehensible weapon, not the source of infinite energy with which he’d hoped to improve the galaxy. Ream him out for his naivety before their reconciliation.

Gerrera dropped them off in the ramshackle bones of a house she suspected was the closest thing he had to a home, and returned to Salient, taking her instructions with him.

There was food, and water, and a space to make livable for a young, inquisitive child. Jyn to keep busy with a datapad, solving puzzles almost faster than Lyra could see shapes resolve into patterns. There was plenty to do, and yet plenty of time to think, and to read the documents Saw left for her to consider, as she inched her way towards a choice between safety . Things the Empire was doing, and things he’d done to set them back.

Gerrera returned a few weeks later, awash in ash in misery. “This is what you helped me to do.” He told her, as he bemusedly fended off Jyn’s attempts to poke him with a stick, mock sparring.

He switched on his holoprojector, and the Salient System where they first met flickered to life. A small system defense force faced down the Imperial Navy, leading them on a chase, and lasting longer than she would have thought possible. Nevertheless, one by one the ships were destroyed. But not before the Salient rebels could snatch the fruits of victory from beneath the Empire’s nose. 

Salient II became a ball of fire before her eyes, the atmosphere alive with flames as the rebels destroyed their own planet rather than relinquish it to the Empire. Once, Lyra might have thought that choice an incomprehensible travesty. But she remembered Samovar and Wadi Raffa, and what had become of even protected planets under the Empire. Remembered Orson Krennic massacring the people of Vallt and her research colleagues indiscriminately for the crime of rebellious dissension. For saying: _No, I refuse. This system takes and takes from us and gives nothing in return. I will stand against this republic this Empire in gestation, come what may, so my children may see better days._ Now, Lyra saw a certain nobility in taking that fate into their own hands, that in their defeat, the enemy lost. Victory would taste like ashes and soured milk to Krennic and his Empire that day. The people of Salient II died free, protecting their planet from the Empire even as they destroyed it. Lyra appreciated the symbolism.

Hadn’t she thought of doing much the same to Krennic, on a smaller, more personal scale?

And there, and there, and there, little patches of green, places free of nearby doonium veins carefully spared the torch. Salient had lost much, but it would one day regrow. Its remaining people would scatter, but one day have the chance to return to their ancestral home, as plants and animals spread again across the surface. The fire was one of rebirth, the destruction not beyond repair — because of Lyra, and the science she gave to soldiers.

“Mama, what wrong?” Jyn tugged on her sleeve, her dear little face twisted in concern. Lyra reached up, and wiped away the wetness of tears. She hadn’t even realized she was crying.

“I told you. You wouldn’t like my methods.” Saw grumbled, his gruff voice the tumbling of rocks in an avalanche.

“Nothing’s wrong, sweetie.” Lyra reached down, and lifted Lyn onto her hip. “You see that green, Gerrera? Your methods are nothing I can’t live with. But call me your damage control, your assurance that your casualties are necessary. And maybe you and all your people will last a little longer before the guilt drags you under, push the Empire a little further. I can help you be a damn fine pain in the Empire’s ass.”

Gerrera replied only with a rough nod.

“Do we have an agreement?” She asked.

“I think you’ll fit in here just fine, Erso.” Saw Gerrera stuck out his hand, and Lyra took it. “Welcome to the Partisans. Let’s bring down an Empire.” Jyn slapped her palm down where their hands met, sealing the agreement with an innocent giggle. The last bit of sunshine in Lyra’s life.

Lyra wasn’t going to bring down the Empire alone. Nor could Saw, whatever his grandiose ambitions. But she could damn well be inconvenient.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The clone wars' finale caused me so much pain. I loved it.
> 
> Next up, The Domestic Adventures of Kit Fisto, Single Father of Thirty


	2. The Domestic Adventures of Kit Fisto, Single Father of Thirty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kit Fisto and his younglings find a different sort of sanctuary.

_0 AFE, Aboard a ship in shock_

Kit Fisto could not be any less prepared to singlehandedly raise thirty Force-sensitive children. Aboard a freighter in hyperspace, on the fifth of many jumps intended to throw a Sith Lord off their trail, hoping to find somewhere remote and quiet to hide undetected. All he needed was a few moments in meditation, to let the pain wash through him, so he could go on a little longer. But there was no time. Not while there were infants sobbing at the pain they sensed, but couldn’t understand, and two quiet younglings who understood too much. 

His hands shook as he handed out rations, as he changed diapers, and triple checked the security of the straps holding each infant safely in place.

The wookie and Rodian initiates helped out as they could, but paused frequently to stare blindly into space. More and more as adrenaline faded into shock.

Finally, miraculously, all of the little younglings slipped into slumber. Thank the Force.

Kit needed to sleep himself, or at least meditate, for he felt sleep would be a long time coming for many months to come, but he made himself approach the two initiates. He did not ask how they felt; the answer was obvious enough. Such a tactic would only push them into themselves, determined to deal with the shock and trauma themselves. He must demonstrate understanding; and to demonstrate understanding, be silent. He had spent little time around younglings, yet his old Padawan had begun his training little older than these. Nahdar always forgot his reservations more when he chose when to begin.

It was a technique that worked better when Kit was not dead on his feet himself, nodding into oblivion only to find it full of ringing screams, jerking back into awareness the same second.

Patience; however, won out.

“Zatt and Byph are dead.” The Rodian girl whispered, choking back a sob. The names must be those of her fellow Initiates. Ones who did not make it onto the ship, nor the two Kit hadn’t had time to prevent sneaking onto the ship carrying Depa and the Jedi who claimed to be Ahsoka Tano with her strange white lightsabers away. “I watched them die.”

The Wookie initiate roared mournfully. Kit did not speak Shyriiwook. That could present a problem.

“Yes, I know I’m stating the obvious, _Gungi_.” The girl snapped. Ah. Perhaps she could provide translation until Kit picked it up. “I just can’t —” She broke off into sobs. The wookie — Gungi — roared again and pulled her into his arms.

Kit suddenly wished he signed up for that workshop on helping to treat childhood trauma he had never thought to need. Now he was responsible for thirty younglings. Thirty younglings carrying more trauma in their bones than Kit could imagine. He had seen much as an adult, old enough to harden, but his youth had been sheltered into his mid-teens, when his master took him on, back in a time when war felt unthinkable.

He could not say, “It will pass.” This would not. He could not say, “It will get better.” There was no guarantee. He could not say, “It will not happen to you.” He did not yet know if they had escaped in truth. So many things he could not promise. So few things he could.

So he said: “It would be false to say grief will make you stronger. What I can say is: you are still alive.”

“What good does that do?” It verged on a snarl.

“So long as you are alive, there is someone to remember them.” He said.

The girl wiped at her tears, her eyes scrunching up as she thought about it. Gungi elbowed her in the side, perhaps agreeing, and she hiccuped. Finally, she said: “I think I can do that.”

“You can.” Kit said. The worst of the first wave was over. There would be nightmares to come. Horrors to face and the temptation of revenge to resist. Kit felt that temptation viscerally. He was not certain he would not have given in, were it not for the younglings. His burden, and perhaps his saving grace. The Force paired them with him for a reason. Perhaps it was for him to guide them, and in guiding them, continue to walk balanced across the precipice.

“Where are we going?” Ganodi sniffed. Kit found he did not have an answer.

They couldn’t travel on forever through space. There was only so much fuel, and so many resources, but infinite unknown spaces at the edge of the galaxy. Enough fuel remained for one last jump, before they would need to make their way somewhere in the Outer Rim to restock, a risk Kit would prefer not to take. Letting the Force guide him, Kit studied the star map, and found his attention drawn to an empty space in the map. Uncharted, but perhaps not empty. There was no quantifying the ways of the Force; all its nudges were left for interpretation. For good or evil, light or dark, fortune or misfortune. Yet there was a tone to the feelings it generated in him, a difference between “here there be rancors,” and “this way to water.” And Kit chose to believe the Force would not be so cruel as to deny these younglings succor in so desperate a time. So be it. He set course for the end of the galaxy on nothing but a feeling.

_0 AFE, A planet that does not exist_

The planet before him was beautiful, blue and green and brown, lacking any sign of large-scale habitation. Yet there were signs of life. Animals mostly, but the heat signatures in a few places across its surface indicated the presence of sentient life. Little stones houses, built onto cliff ledges. Kit brought the ship in for an inexpert landing as far from a cliff as possible, with the initiates sitting in the co-pilot and navigation chairs. The ship felt silent, oppressively so, after days in hyperspace, only brief jumps between to correct course.

Only Ganodi and Gungi had left Coruscant and the Jedi Temple since arriving, and then, only briefly to find their crystals. Kit fielded question after question from each youngling, when they had recovered from the shock enough to wonder, all asking the same thing in different ways: when could they go home. He was as honest as possible, told them they were going to a new home. They could not go back. Lying would not help. Force sensitive younglings were most sensitive to falsehood, could usually not imagine that a falsehood might be told for good reason.

Their landing scattered a group of creatures, inquisitive little birds that quickly adjusted to their presence, curiously approaching the ship before Kit even disembarked. The younglings were to stay on board, watched over by Gungi. The Wookie was good with the little ones, he’d found. They liked him, much more than they liked Kit. Must be the fur, less scary than his tentacles.

The birds scattered again as the ramp lowered, but he caught glimpses of the same ones peaking out from behind rocks as he and Ganodi made his way towards the nearest village.

Ganodi peered back suspiciously. “I don’t like the look of those things.” She said. One edged closer, but bolted when it saw her glare.

“I think they’re harmless.” Kit said. Thieves scavenging for sparkly things at worst.

“Hey!” Ganodi shrieked, spinning around, patting at her belt where her lightsaber had hung moments earlier. “That’s mine!” She growled at an escaping bird, and gave chase. Kit had no choice but to chase after, to make sure she didn’t break her neck.

He found her stomping her foot at the entrance to a hole between rocks, into which he caught sight of a white bottom and orange stick-like legs disappearing. “Allow me.” He said.

Ganodi frowned. “Unless you can shrink down in size, I don’t see how you’re going to —”

Kit summoned the lightsaber, the bird still attached, squawking and holding on by one wing. “Like that.” He said as he peeled bird from saber.

“Oh.” Ganodi said. “Right. I could have done that.” Kit couldn’t blame her for forgetting, under the circumstances.

“Keep track of that.” He said. “It’s your li-” That wasn’t the most appropriate thing to say. “It’s your best defense.” He finished.

Their little adventure had driven them off track and downhill, so it was a bit more of a hike than he’d expected to reach the nearest potential village. Ganodi raced toward it with little Force-magnified jumps pushing her from rock to rock. Kit followed more slowly; it didn’t feel right to use the Force anymore. Perhaps it was true younglings were more resilient. Or at least more receptive to the simple pleasures of sun on a rocky cliff, her mood boosted despite herself by the thrill of chasing after a cute animal. For Kit, the equivalent would be a swim in the depths of the waters beneath them.

At the top of the cliff, they were greeted by a group of scaled, grey avian sentients in simple clothing, who gabbled a phrase in greeting that Kit could not understand. A female presenting individual sighed in what Kit read as disappointment and gestured with a gray-hand that Kit and Ganodi should follow.

“Do we follow?” Ganodi asked, “They feel… right.”

They did, like the soothing waves of the sun-warmed shallows, a balm on the screaming wound that was the Force. Like they were dedicated to the Force, as much or more as the Jedi had been, though none felt Force sensitive. “I believe we must. The Force led us here for a reason.” It must have; this feeling was too much to be a coincidence. They followed after the feminine leader, as other members of the group left to fulfill their various and sundry tasks of daily life. A group stayed behind, arguing through animated gestures and squeaky groans. One carried a wind instrument resembling a bagpipe up towards a higher cliff, and began to play. It did, in fact, sound like a bagpipe. One waddled off to a cliff edge and dove, a net in hand for fishing. Kit hoped the waters held fish that he and the younglings from carnivorous and omnivorous species could safely eat. As the native species likely evolved to eat the planet’s fauna, there was no guarantee. He’d have to figure out how to ask for a sample to test for intolerances and poisons.

It was slow going, matching the meandering pace of the leader’s stick like legs. Ganodi kicked at the grass as she walked, sending up sprays of dirt and tufts of grass to amuse herself as they went. Only when the leader stopped to glare at her with judgment in her eyes did Ganodi stop. “Grandma’s scary.” Ganodi whispered to him, and Kit had to suppress a snort. From the glare he received in return, he was unsuccessful in stifling his indiscretion.

A group of the little thieving birds swarmed Ganodi once again, this time demanding she stroke the feathers on their heads, rather than making off with her dearest belonging. She giggled, complying, a little ounce of real joy sparking amidst the bleakness.

The leader in her matronly apron led Kit and Ganodi to a group of stone huts on a cliff. Homey, but small. Columns of smoke wafted out of the chimneys, bringing with them the scent of roasting fish and freshly baked bread. (He rather hoped that was evidence the big-eyed little birds were friends, not food). A younger looking local, dressed all in white, as all the women seemed to do, bustled out of a hut with a basket full of laundry, the wind threatening to blow off her wimple. The cultural implications were fascinating, the simple lifestyle much like the ideal the Jedi once strove for, before… Before.

(It seemed they had lost that simplicity long before the end, traded it for armor and influence and disaster.)

But Kit’s attention was not drawn by the huts; rather by a tree up a curving stone staircase. An ancient tree that looked dead, yet felt alive, its large branches tapering off into broken, spiked ends. An uneti tree, sacred to the Jedi. The tree was more ancient than even the one in the Room of a Thousand Fountains in the Jedi Temple. Kit had not spared a thought for the one lost to them, too focused on survival in the present to worry about what the loss such a unique specimen would mean in the grander scheme of things. Yet there one stood before him. An arched doorway split the trunk, large enough to admit him if he stooped nearly in two.

He started towards it without thinking, drawn in by the pull of a strange familiarity. Realizing only then that he had not asked permission to enter a sacred, ancient place that was not his own, despite how welcoming it felt, he turned back to the matron. She stared back at him, and though he could not read her expression, Kit got the distinct impression she was amused. He took that as tacit permission, and — sparing a glance for Ganodi, buried in the new pets that had claimed her for a mistress and paying him no attention at all — he climbed the steps. His heart beat an anticipatory Nautolan tango as he ducked inside. Though his eyes were built for the darkness of depths, it took a moment to adjust from the sun-bright exterior. And then — 

Kit thought at first he was hallucinating. For inside were texts. Cracked, and old, and powerful. Texts that spoke of the secrets of ages, orders and beliefs of the distant past. He left without looking further. One day, he would seek the wisdom contained within. But for the moment logistics and physical necessities needed to take priority.

The matron nodded in approval when he returned, shoving a basketful of fresh bread, slightly burnt fish, and something stinky he hoped was cheese into his arms. The bread was stuffed with some sort of local nut, though he had not yet seen many trees. He accepted with a courtly bow. She showed him to a large, empty hut, with a fire warming its hearth, but with no signs of recent habitation.

“For us?” He asked, pointing to himself.

She nodded.

“Thank you.” He bowed again to express his gratitude. It wouldn’t be safe in the long-term for many of the younglings, from fragile species not designed for cliff dwelling or diving. But it would give them time to acclimate to the planet, for Kit to figure out how to build a permanent dwelling in a safer location. For the first time, he let himself hope his younglings were not without a future.

_1 AFE, Safe Harbor_

For a long time after they arrived on Ahch’to, and a long time after Kit let himself accept that it could truly be their safe harbor, he did not so much as touch the ancient texts hidden within their sacred tree. He was too busy with the younglings, he told himself. And for some time that was true; even the Lanai, as multi-talented at all things necessary to ordinary life as they were — an area in which Kit was almost entirely lacking — they could not meet all the needs of so many younglings of so many species they had never before encountered. Kit learned to feed bottles, change diapers, calm tantrums. He did all those things over and over, and taught lessons to those old enough.

Eventually there were no more infants. Small, unruly younglings, yes, but younglings who could be occupied with chores and games and learning. Still, he delayed. It was when Kit realized he was afraid that he finally decided he must face them, whatever contents they held.

He was afraid of the judgments of ancients, the pronouncement that the Jedi had erred by involving themselves in the greater workings of the galaxy. Jedi were peacekeepers, he had always believed. They had not kept the peace in the end.

Kit found himself utterly free of tasks the moment he reached that conclusion, as though the Matron of the Lanai had somehow known, and made certain he had no more excuse to duck his fate. He could, instead, have taken a nap. Or gone for a swim, breathed in the depths for longer than the few minutes he allowed himself each morning to maintain his health. Both were tempting options. But Kit would have been a poor Jedi indeed if he had not learned how to persuade himself into distasteful tasks. He climbed the stairs to the tree, as alluring as ever. He reached out a shaking hand, picked up the first book on the shelf, and began to read.

When he was through, not with everything, but with enough for a few spare hours, he sat on the top step and stroked the head of a porg that nuzzled against his leg. The books contained no judgment. There were rituals, blade techniques, records of daily life — including, oddly, a few marriage ceremonies between Jedi — and the record of another fall. The ancient Jedi Order had fallen, pulled between rival powers or facing the Sith, risen and fallen and risen again. Time and time again, the knowledge lost to the ages after centuries of peace, supposed through the distance of time to have been one long, drawn out war against generations of Sith.

The Sith had been more than a myth, then. But Master and Apprentice alone was not enough to face an order of many, when the many were trained in the skills to fight them. They schemed and manipulated and used the machineries of empire already set into place. Master murdered apprentice until apprentice murdered master. And sometimes, people made war all on their own. The Jedi had never died out to their current degree, but never had a Sith had the means or technology to place a kill switch in a ready made human army that stood at the backs of Jedi.

The ancient Jedi avoided war when they could; it was not always possible.

“ _There_ you are.” Ganodi wrinkled her snout as she called up the stairs, Gungi tugging worriedly at her shoulder. “We’ve been looking _everywhere_.”

Oh, bother. “Who fell off a cliff?” Kit called back as he levered himself to his feet. “Or did they jump?”

“No, silly. You’re late for our lessons.” She pouted, falling into step behind him on the way back to the hut they all still shared, albeit with many a baby proofing safeguard.

Ah, their lessons. The lightsaber ones and guided meditations, each at the level of a beginner Padawan rather than senior Initiates, though he had not yet asked either to become his Padawan.

“We’ll start with a meditation, then.” He said as they reached a grass plane otherwise occupied by younglings playing tag. The positive feelings brought about by their laughter helped in finding his and his students’ centers alike with the Force still wracked by aftershocks.

“Awwwww.” Ganodi groaned, though Gungi took up position without complaint.

“Your forms are always better after an effective meditation.” He reminded her. “You were sloppy in your movements and never reached your center yesterday, when we did it the other way around.”

“Fine.” She grumped, clearly disagreeing, but fidgeted her way into serenity as he walked her slowly through the steps. As he watched them, Kit thought he understood why the ancient Jedi built a depository of knowledge in a place that seemed to have been a retreat. It had been a place for retreat when clarity was needed. Kit was in need of clarity, and so he believed the Force had helped guide his way here. Where he could find what he needed to continue on, and, perhaps, light a lantern on the path forward through the dark.

_4 AFE, a planet named by the ancients_

It took the better part of four years for Kit to passably understand both Shyriiwook and the language of the natives, the Lanai. Ganodi and Gungi, his official Padawans, because he could not just take on one when they asked, learned the latter much more quickly. They were a great help, in everything. Eager students, clever and quick. Gungi was especially talented with children, from the excitable toddlers to the moodier pre-teens. He picked up meditation techniques and saber techniques so rapidly Kit was running out of things to teach him. Ganodi strung together functioning lights and devices from the ship’s nonessentials, found the best location for the permanent homestead near to the Lanai yet a safe distance from the cliffs, set up railings to prevent the little ones from falling off.

For some months, both had asked to accompany Kit on his next supply run into the parts of the Outer Rim not forgotten by time. Kit always said no. Those runs were necessary - to fill dietary gaps for a few younglings that could not be met on the planet, which the Lanai named Ahch’to, to refill the medicine supply. He usually picked up new parts for Ganodi to work with as well. They didn’t need to come. It wasn’t safe.

But that morning, as Kit completed his daily pre-dawn swim among a school of long, scaled fish the length of his body, he thought he might need to give in. There was much about the state of the galaxy he was reluctant to share with the younglings. The younger ones were content, remembering their former home scarcely at all. Happy younglings, content to race across the planes, wishing for nothing more than to escape the day’s lessons.

Gungi and Ganodi were exceptions. They could not forget. Seeing what the galaxy had become under the Empire was a necessity, eventually. But Kit suspected the both of them would want to leave, to chase after justice and do what they could once they knew the truth for a certainty. That way, Kit felt certain, led death. As they were, neither Padawan was ready to face the galaxy alone. Kit could not join them, with younglings still to care for. Nor did he wish to. He had seen enough of war and death. His was now the way of peace, a way that needed to survive in isolation, for the day the Empire fell and a better way replaced it. That might not be the way chosen by his Padawans, and he would accept it.

But perhaps they could come to a compromise.

Kit went through the ordinary motions of his day. Picked up breakfast for thirty from the Lanai. They had once, early on, seen Kit trying to cook saguaro paddles with the spines still attached and refused to let him handle uncooked food ever again. Gungi had learned some, but he was no more a morning Wookie than any teenager. Kit didn’t technically need his meat to be cooked, though it was preferable, so he’d never learned to cook for himself, much less the twenty-three different diets that needed to be catered to. He didn’t know how to slice a vegetable, how long to cook different meats to render them safe, but he could make a pot of tea. He set a pot to boil over Ganodi’s simple electric burner, and rang the alarm bell to retrieve the little monsters from slumber.

Dashtii, an eight year old red Nikto, sat bolt upright in bed and scrambled for the Lanai’s offerings. Woke with a pit in his stomach, that one. Ganodi didn’t stir. Up into the early morning hours tinkering with her tech, she slept like the dead. At least there didn’t appear to be any porgs joining her that morning, the adorable, chaotic menaces. Gungi slept under a pile of younglings who thought him the best pillow possible. Though he pulled the covers determinedly over his eyes, wailing his dismay, the squirming younglings climbing over and off his gangly mop of a teenage body drove him fully awake. The same happened ever morning, and yet he did not stop the little ones from climbing onto him to sleep.

The kettle’s whistle blew, and Kit busied himself pouring water over leaves as the younglings and one awake Padawan gathered around their large, stone table, joining Dashtii, who was well into a bowl of fried lawa eggs on rice. Gungi roared his thanks as Kit set his food down before him with a brimming cup of tea. Always polite, though both of them despaired of ever teaching these wild children of Ahch’to some manners. They grabbed with their hands, scarfing their food down enthusiastically, the way the Lanai showed appreciation for cooking.

“I’d like to speak with you and Ganodi after lessons today.” Kit told him.

Gungi nodded, chewing, though he was rapidly distracted by a human youngling tugging on a tuft of hair on his chin.

Lessons passed slowly and in a rush as they always did — he droned on until his voice grew hoarse, but also had the perpetual challenge of forcing younglings to sit still rather than be tempted off by many a playful porg. They did not understand the usefulness of reading, save a few, who were of a bookish nature, and for whom Kit could never bring back enough books downloaded onto a datapad. “Dashtii, last I checked the sky did not have any hidden messages written across it.” He admonished.

“The clouds are more interesting than your silly books, old man.” Dashtii retorted.

Kit sent a wish and a prayer off into the Force for patience, wondering once again how it had chanced upon him to become the custodian of the Jedi’s future. He often found himself unsuited for the challenge. Master Plo Koon would have done a far better job, known instinctively how to deal with every scraped knee and petty argument. And yet - he would have liked to see Mace Windu tasked with herding younglings for years on end. He would have lost his temper within the first hour.

Kit had, perhaps, not been the worst option. Though it was certainly fortunate they had found a planet full of caretakers, or they might all have starved.

He knew, consciously, that there was likely a reason why Dashtii had more difficulty learning in class than the others, but he did not know how to tell if it was mixing up letters, or attention span, both, or something else entirely. Sometimes it helped if he made class more active, though.

“Dashtii, why don’t you start reading from Mora’s Sooth — you can do your voices.” He said.

Dashtii brightened, and began, stumbling only a few times on long words.

After, he saw the younglings off to their chores and other lessons: helping the Lanaii with laundry or prepare for dinner, even music lessons for one talented young Togruta.

Kit returned to the hut. He made another pot of tea, and waited for Gungi and Ganodi (ultimately pulled out of bed by the Wookie she saw as her brother. Kit could think of no more appropriate word.) from practicing their forms.

How to phrase his deal? Padawans always thought themselves near adults. His Padawans, who took on responsibilities far beyond what should have been asked of them, were in some ways correct to think that. In others, they were unprepared for the galaxy outside, but would not want to admit it.

They had escaped pirates and survived a massacre — and then spent four years in isolation. They didn’t know how to avoid detection and the calling of an Inquisitor, where to find what items, when or how to barter, what the cost of a loaf of bread should be. In the Jedi temple, all things had been taken care of, so students could focus on learning to understand the Force. They had seen everything and nothing of the galaxy.

“What is it?” Ganodi asked without announcing herself. She had gotten very good at walking without making a sound, concealing herself even within the Force. Kit steadied his teacup before it could fall. “Tea?” He offered.

Gungi roared his acceptance, while Ganodi rolled her eyes before saying: “Sure.” In that sardonic teenager tone she’d picked up the day he met her and never dropped, from what Gungi claimed.

He took a moment to pour their tea, waiting until they both took a sip. “I’ve decided that you’re right, it is time you joined me on supply runs.”

Cacophony. Ganodi jumped to her feet, shrieking in excitement. Gungi roared in confusion.

“But.” He held up a finger. “I have a few conditions. First, that you will do exactly as I say when I say it.” He continued over the beginnings of Ganodi’s indignant objection. “I can frequent only the most remote, lawless of ports and until you learn their ways, it will be dangerous to do otherwise.”

Ganodi opened her mouth to protest and snapped it closed again, tilting her head to reconsider. “Worth it.” She finally declared.

Gungi nodded again.

Here was the tricky part: “Second, I ask that if you choose to leave for the wider galaxy, you will wait. To learn some tricks you will need, and long enough that our youngest youngling is ten years of age.” Another six years. Ganodi would reach adulthood in that time, and though Gungi would still be considered a child by the standards of his long-lived people, he would have reached a stage of his life where his decision making abilities were mostly developed.

Gungi expressed his dismay at the idea of abandoning his pups.

Ganodi sat back, folding her arms across her chest. “Sounds reasonable. You’d never manage that raggedy lot all on your own.”

“Third, eventually, the two of you may go together without me. But don’t expect that to be anytime soon.” Kit rather liked the idea of a break from the cycle of re-entering the galaxy and returning to peaceful existence on Ahch’to. It always made him feel off balance.

They agreed. Kit had won, but it felt as though he had lost.

Tattooine was a hotbed of crime and discontent and literal heat. It was not Kit’s favorite place for a supply run by a longshot, but it was the one he hit least frequently. A place where bounty hunters gathered, who could be convinced to share the latest news for a small fee. Kit had long ago discovered that he was not on any wanted list, and so the bounty hunters had no reason to think him anything beyond a climatically displaced Nautolan trader.

There were many methods he needed to introduce his Padawans to. But unfortunately, the most vital was an introduction to the way of the bounty hunter bar. Fortunately, their first encounter would be Sugi Emari, a bounty hunter who had worked with Jedi in the past, though never Kit. She had figured out what he was, and helped him escape the detection of an Inquisitor early on, though he carried no evidence.

(He talked like Kenobi, she said. Kit had no idea whether it had been meant as a compliment, but he took it as one. It was then he knew she was more trustworthy than most.)

Ganodi, in her element in a ship, but unused to new people, hummed with nerves as she triple checked their navigation, the state of the engines, the communications. Gungi fiddled with the heat-wicking cloak in his lap. Wookies were rare these days. Free Wookies, at least. He would attract attention. A disguise would do no harm, and possibly much good. “What would happen if I walked in and called them all short little bastards?” Ganodi attempted to distract herself with bad jokes.

It was not funny. “Please don’t sass the bounty hunters, not all of them are quite so forgiving as my contact.” He reminded them again. “I’m too old for bar fights, and you’re too young.” He unintentionally got in bar fights with disturbing regularity, actually. But he didn’t _start_ them. Unless it made for a good distraction and a quick getaway.

Gungi informed them that he was too young for bar fights, and Ganodi was too.

“Like I’d let a little thing like drinking age stop me from having fun.” Ganodi retorted, though she spent good portions of her days purposefully burying herself in solitary work.

Sugi: tall, a peach-skinned zabrak, the spikes protruding from her head painting her with the sort of toughness that bread a compassionate heart. She sat with another zabrak in her early teens, a relative from their similar appearance, though not her daughter. Sugi was uninterested in romance, always laughing off attempts at flirting and offending only those who deserved to be offended in the process. She was more likely to adopt a town’s worth of people after a minute’s acquaintance than produce a child of her own. She noticed Kit as he and his Padawans took their seats in a booth Kit unceremoniously kicked a couple of drunk-dozing Chadra-Fan out of to procure. Sugi knocked back her drink and said something to her companion before swaggering her way over to them.

“You’re not alone today.” Kit said in lieu of a greeting. He didn’t think Sugi would betray his identity, but he hadn’t suspected the evil lurking beneath Chancellor Palpatine’s grating joviality until it was too late, hadn’t known the Republic was a Pluterian stork’s neck held up by stilts so fragile a light gust of wind could blow it over, leaving only a pile of sticks rapidly snatched up by other storks for other nests with no stronger foundations. So who could say much for Kit’s judgment?

“My niece.” Sugi said as the girl in question glanced over and away, more interested in polishing her blaster than her aunt’s clients. “She thinks you’re ‘another one of my charity cases.’” That last in an imitation of her niece that sounded rather like Ganodi in a mood. “Jas likes to believe she’s in it for herself, but if — when — something happens to me, her prices are fair and she knows when not to ask questions. Are these your kids?”

She shifted topics Kit could not ask if she thought she was being targeted.

“Yes, my adopted daughter and son.” Kit confirmed, knowing from the delighted mischief in Ganodi’s star-filmed eyes that she would never let him live that down, adhering as they all did to the structure of the Jedi, though Kit effectively played the roll of a questionably competent father. Gungi pressed his eyes over his face, the Wookie equivalent of a blush at a surprising complement. “It’s time they saw more of the galaxy.”

“There are safer places to start.” Sugi said.

“But fewer safer people.” Kit replied.

She nodded. “What do you have for me this time?”

As the initial supplies began to run out, early on in their time on Ahch’to, Kit had been left with a dilemma. Credits were necessary to buy anything, and Kit didn’t exactly have the resources or knowledge to produce, say, Twi’lek specific respiratory inhalers. He could have taken up bounty hunting himself. Lower level targets would have been quick, easy money. But those circles carried other risks, the most obvious of which was registration. Smuggling had been the only other thing he could think of. He’d been lurking around a board with odd jobs posted on it, from tracking down a lost tooka to carting crate loads of spice through Imperial jurisdiction, none of which seemed like a good investment of time versus profit, when a kyuzo bounty hunter with a wide-brimmed hat and a pet anooba asked where he’d gotten his blaster case.

A blaster case that had been handmade and imprinted by a youngling with an interest in handicrafts.

Handmade specialty items, it turned out, went for a fair amount of credits. Running a pop-up handicrafts trade required no business licensing, so long as he didn’t have a storefront. Bounty hunters and smugglers were happy enough to be his middleman with legitimate merchants, so long as they got a cut of the profits. Sugi took a lower commission than most.

Kit picked up knitting. Ganodi cobbled together customs lamps. The various other younglings contributed with leather bags and blaster cases, and even the Lanai contributed, so long as he brought back chocolate and seeds and fish from around the galaxy for them to try.

“All in there, including your new scarf.” He said.

Sugi pulled out her scarf, fingering the pattern of stitches that perfectly complimented her coloring. “This is perfect. Next week, at the crossroads?” She asked. “That should be plenty of time to sell off this haul.” She handed over a pouch full of physical credits, the only sort he could accept.

True to Sugi’s word, her niece did not ask questions, at least not where he could see.

“Where are the crossroads?” Ganodi asked, later, as Kit handed over credits for that asthma medication.

He pressed a finger against his lips and answered only when they were back in hyperspace. “A codeword. The crossroads are where all battles cease.”

Ganodi was not satisfied with that answer; not until she met Maz Kanata. Kit could tell, from the way she asked question after question of the ancient not-quite Jedi. Gungi was drawn into a game of sabacc by a rowdy freighter crew who claimed to know a Wookie captain who’d escaped Kashyyyk, and offered to introduce him. First visits to Takodana were always overwhelming. Kit had expected no less, even as he instructed them in a new saber technique before leaving, and they assured him they would pay the utmost attention to the transaction. Now, he was certain they were regretting the promise to wait six years to decide their paths.

No one was ever prepared for Maz.

(Maz tolerated Kit because he was the only Jedi she knew to be alive, though he did not quite trust the way she emphasized Jedi, as though there were an almost or not quite missing between her words.)

Sugi was in her element at Maz’s, buying a full round of drinks for the house on longstanding credit. Maz permitted it, but told her every time she would not last if she didn’t slow down. “Your scarf worked like a charm - we had a bounty on a winter world.” Sugi said, shouting over the crowd. “But Jas caught a solo bounty, so I’m back on my own.”

“How did we do this time?” Kit asked. Sugi tossed him a much heavier than usual pouch. “You tell me.”

He watched as his Padawans laughed among new people, people who could stretch their growth in new directions Kit could never guide them in, and wondered instead how much he had lost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After I wrote this I belatedly realized that Zatt -- the Nautolan youngling I killed off -- was the one that was into tech, not Ganodi. But she was the one who fixed the David Tennant robot, so I went ahead with her having tech skills since someone needed to.
> 
> For anyone who hasm't read the Aftermath trilogy, Jas Emari is a main character in that and I love her.
> 
> In the next chapter, I'll be making up things about Mandalore in the name of Bo-Katan's character development. Most of which I expect not to be addressed in canon since Star Wars seems determined to never let Mandalore have a functioning government again.


	3. Bo-Katan Kryze's Guide To Acing this Duchess Thing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bo-Katan is just trying to make sure her people survive the Empire, but being Duchess of Mandalore comes with a side of kidnappings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back in June I told myself I'd just take a short break from working on this for PhD reasons and then I came down with a shiny new hyperfixation. That's still running strong, but I promised myself I'd split my nano word count between fic(s) for that and this. Lo and behold, I finished the scene in the next chapter I'd been stuck on since June on day 1 and can finally update!
> 
> Disclaimer on this chapter: if you're really attached to the old EU version of Mandalore this chapter might not be your thing, idk? (what I've heard about the EU doesn't appeal to me enough when I already have an eternal TBR list) So here's an extra I use Disney canon and also make things up reminder! 
> 
> I also may have entirely forgotten about that time Bo-Katan slaughtered a village until this was more than halfway written.

_3 AFE - Sundari, Mandalore: A So-Called Desert Utopia_ , _standing before a metaphorical firing squad_

The Thirty-first Treaty of Concord Dawn was signed two years after Duchess Bo-Katan Kryze surrendered to the Empire with her crown still cold on her brow. The official commemorative holos framed Duchess Kryze with the silhouette of Concord Dawn, a fragmented memorial to Mandalore’s glory and decline, as she shook the hand of Moff Wilhuff Tarkin, the emperor’s favorite about the new Imperial Station .

The slimy bastard.

In that holo, Bo-Katan wore the calla lily headress of her station, a formal Nite Owl uniform decorated with medals she had earned and been handed by the galaxy’s latest overlords alike, and a smile pasted on over gritted teeth. Afterwards, the captain of her guard had blithely informed her she looked like she was about to stuff Tarkin’s false metals down his throat and bash head in with his celebratory bottle of Toniray for good measure. The thought had crossed her mind.

The metals were a calculated insult disguised as an honor, one she could not refuse.

The public believed the treaty a formality. Referred to in whispers as the Kryze Capitulation, its reception was mixed. Some saw a strategic alliance, others a betrayal of core Mandalorian values, whether those values favored peace, or war. Still others saw blood on sand and apocalypse in the Empire’s wake, and knew the Duchess did as she must. Mandalore had not been a united front in many generations. The treaty was no exception.

If only it had been that simple.

The negotiations had been long, and she’d lost ground for every scrap of victory bought with tooth and nail. A stable Mandalore was in the Empire’s favor, a Duchess with a claim to its throne without the trappings of her predecessor’s hard won and harder lost neutrality an attractive prospect. She could not be called illegitimate, her coronation would not spark immediate uprisings. After all, she was her sister’s heir — and heir to her sister’s once-rival. She was a symbol to more than one faction. She was the best of many bad options. That had worked in her favor, given her a hand to play.

But then there were the Saxons. Gar Saxon had already been halfway to declaring himself the Empire’s shiny new Governor, already enlisted to the Imperial Navy with a commission, when Bo returned to Sundari. The treacherous dickbags would have traded every last speck of their own culture for a title and the illusion of power. The Empire did not want civil war from Mandalore. It wanted recruits. Recruits would be far easier to come by if Mandalore’s factions weren’t busy fighting each other. Bo was the easiest path. But should she ever misstep, ever push too far, her usurper waited in the wings. She knew it.

And Tarkin knew it.

Bo came out of negotiations feeling like she’d just bathed in a Sarlac’s digestive tract. Tarkin left looking like he could walk on clouds.

But jurisdiction of civilian affairs would be left to local authorities, save where an Imperial representative could provide proof of treason.

The Empire would have one sovereign base per system. Quarterly inspection of government finances would be mandatory. All trade agreements would pass through the Empire. She could not claim the title Manda’lor.

And so long as the recruitment quota for the year was met by volunteers, there would be no draft. It seemed a small, meaningless thing. Tarkin had certainly thought so, taken her for a naïve creature too concerned with public relations to know what she’d given up. It was not solely a public relations coup, though Tarkin underestimated the power of people. There would be enough volunteers, at least for years to come. Many would be genuine. Some would be hers. Feeding back information, or lying in wait for the day they would be called to action.

She could not have gotten as much as she had without Satine. And now, Satine was gone.

A year and a day after the treaty’s signing, Bo leaned further back in her chair than was strictly advisable and moaned, rubbing at her temples. The fiftieth report of the day had taken on a life of her own and was staring at her judgmentally. She could feel it.

Bo thought, not for the first time, that she couldn’t do this. She didn’t know anything about agricultural policy. She needed budget and taxes laid out so a five-year-old could understand them. Couldn’t go a week without insulting some envoy. Couldn’t tell whether she was about to secure her reign or sharpen her own guillotine. “Satine, why did you leave me alone?” Her voice was chocked.

And yet, how could Satine have stayed, after all Bo did to her?

Satine would have known not to complement an Iktotchi diplomat’s horns — Bo still wasn’t sure whether the man had thought she was hitting on him, or challenging him to a duel. Only admitting her inexperience had salvaged the hyperlane access agreement, and she’d had to give more than intended.

Not to mention that report, a submission by the loathsome Minister of Agriculture. Bo could not make heads or tails of it. It didn’t seem right that the hydroponics facilities Sundari relied on as a food source if trade routes were cut off had seen a 30% uptick in water demands and a 10% decrease in production, but she didn’t know enough about hydroponics to be certain. She hated the man, but that didn’t make him corrupt. Satine would have been able to tell.

Bo had never been meant to lead. Give her something tangible to fight, point her in the right direction, and she’d get the job done. But leading a system? She’d seen her sister bringing peace to her system, but erasing their culture in the process, and assumed she wouldn’t listen. Instead of, say, speaking to her, Bo had fallen in with a charming demagogue who sought to undo the bright parts of Satine’s legacy along with her failures. Hardly the qualities of a good leader.

(She did not stop to consider that Satine might not have every unique diplomatic custom in the galaxy memorized, that she did not understand the details of hydroponic horticulture. Had learned how to prepare through experience and believed she could trust her advisers, until she couldn’t. All she could feel was the weight of the world, all she could see the distance to the stars.)

At least Satine had finally run off with that Jedi of hers, where she could do some good in a way that might, finally, make her happy. Bo had never much cared for Obi-wan Kenobi, not since he swept Satine off on an adventure and left Bo behind in hiding all those years ago. That none of Satine’s intermittent suitors had ever measured up — to a Jedi of all people! — had never managed to keep her interest for longer than a few months hadn’t helped her opinion of the man. But she had to admit, Satine smiled if not more often, than more genuinely these days. If they were both still carrying a torch so many years later, well — Satine deserved some happiness, and Bo was not longer in a position to resent her for it.

Even if she _did_ have to clean up the mess she’d left behind. Three years in, half her ministers were still holdovers of uncertain loyalty, and half of those she’d replaced, imperial stooges. She’d had to have her _third_ Minister of Finance in as many years “accidentally” spaced from his personal yacht two months ago after she realized he was a firewall away from tracking down Satine’s fortune. And here she was, about to negotiate a loan from the Banking Clan so she could implement a plan that would either make or break her reign, with only her personal assistant to help.

Not even Korkie was left to her, off attending the Imperial Academy on Coruscant as a show of loyalty. His idea — her only heir, willingly joining the Empire? What a gesture! No subterfuge there. Not that pretending to goodwill was his only purpose. He planned to work his way up the ranks and play the spider, connecting the threads of all their planted recruits. It would be another year before he left the Academy, and he would most likely be shortlisted as a liaison officer or translator. There wasn’t much spying he could do at the academy, beyond the occasional drunken mutterings of senators at the soirees where he was put on exhibit like a dancing monkey-lizard in formal uniform. An example of what a good little heir to an Imperial system looked like.

Still, she worried. Korkie took too much after Satine. He would never be able to pull the trigger on anyone, much less an innocent. He would never be able to give that order. According to his latest letter, his strategy for the former was working — he was still at the top of every class, except marksmanship. Which he was failing. “Excellent officer material, but couldn’t hit the broad side of a star destroyer with an ion cannon.” Korkie quoted his instructor proudly. That wouldn’t help when it came time to give orders. And the Empire wouldn’t hesitate to put her heir on the front lines.

The request for a sewing kit had also been worrisome. “I missed my old hobby.” Korkie wrote. So far as Bo knew, his old hobby was slicing. He’d never so much as embroidered his initials in his life.

There was a knock on the door, and her assistant, Nicz Tallo, poked her head in.

“ _What?_ ” Bo snapped, more irritably than intended.

Nicz squeaked and jerked backwards, so only her fingertips were visible. For Kriff’s sake, the woman had survived being _Satine’s_ assistant. Bo was not nearly so frightening. (Satine might be a _pacifist_ , and Bo might carry at least ten weapons on her personal at all times, but Satine was the one with the temper. The one who could be tracked by the trail of shattered martini glasses, when she was in a mood). “I’m not going to bite your head off. What is it?”

The door opened to reveal Nicz, straightening her suit jacket, her tan cheeks flushed with embarrassment. Her long black hair was escaping its bun with a determination it usually only reached at the end of the day. “The Banking Clan Representative is here.”

Bo sighed. “I don’t suppose I have time for a nice, leisurely cup of kaf before I go to meet him?”

“The Banking Clan adds 0.1% interest for every minute they’re kept waiting.” Nicz informed her apologetically. “I’ll get a cup of kaf with your formal headdress.” She vanished before Bo could blink.

“Those greedy little bastards.” Bo grumbled, but stood. No one ever paid back a Banking Clan loan — it look scarcely a year after the Imperial takeover for the Clan to not only restore its former prosperity but expand — but it couldn’t look like she didn’t intend to. That was, unfortunately, politics: the price of her sins. When it came to ten billion credits, 0.1% could make the difference between success and bankruptcy. It was a policy of dubious legality, but now that the Banking Clan was under the direct mandate of the Emperor, no one wanted to take the point up with him. By the time she made it to the hall, Nicz was back, pressing the promised kaf into her hands and securing the cursed headdress with practiced movements.

That was why Bo kept her around. Nicz was a little island of efficiency in a government full of stonewallers. She was trustworthy - she knew the location of the little rebellion brewing on the edge of the galaxy, and they hadn’t been riddled with holes yet. She understood money better than Bo ever could. Maybe… well, she would never know if she didn’t try.

“Are you sure about this, your Grace?” Nicz asked as they walked, shooting her a nervous glance.

Instead of answering, she said: “You’re one of Satine’s New Mandalorians.”

Nicz blanched. “I-”

Bo suppressed a snort. It might have given the poor woman a heart attack. “Did you never wonder why I kept you on?”

“It had crossed my mind.” Nicz said, suspicious but with more spine than she’d expected. That was good. Bo knew what to do with spine.

“We’ve spent too long in a cycle, with a new faction overthrowing the old every generation or two.” Bo had survived a coup, and been complicit in attempts at another. Until they’d succeeded, and she saw her mistakes what they were. “It’s time we stopped pretending there’s only one way to be Mandalorian.”

“You want… you want to find common ground. Between the New Mandalorians and… Death Watch?” Her assistant looked horrified. Good thing _that_ was an impossible prospect. Death Watch no longer existed.

“Death Watch were extremists. No one knows that better than me.” The former members who’d taken her side against Maul had adopted the name ‘Nite Owls’ for a reason. “I want to build bridges between our subcultures, so the next Pre-Viszla can’t find enough of a foothold to throw us into another civil war.” So the Saxons couldn’t.

“That’s impossible.” Nicz breathed, but her eyes were shining with a vision of that impossible world.

“I didn’t say it would be easy.” Bo gave her a twisted half-smile. “Are you willing to try?”

“I…Yes.” It was the most firm Bo had ever heard her.

“So no, I’m not certain.” She circled back to Nicz’s original question. “But I believe this loan is a risk worth taking.”

Reaching her throne room, Bo threw open the doors herself as the Protectors stepped aside. Never let it be said she couldn’t at least make an entrance. Dramatic entrances were in her blood, even if she made them in polished armor rather than trailing gowns.

The Banking Clan representative glanced up from their glass of some priceless whiskey her cellars would never be able to replace. Unfamiliar with Neimoidian facial expressions and gender cues as she was, Bo couldn’t tell whether they were impressed or bored, male or female or neither. Neimoidians had a high male to female gender ratio, right? Either way, faking it was all she’d been doing since her coronation. She’d manage. Bo passed them without acknowledgment and took her throne. Only once seated, with Nicz standing in position on her right, did she meet his eyes. “Welcome to Mandalore, Representative…?”

“Representative is fine.” They said, staring at her with unblinking eyes. If they weren’t part of a notoriously corrupt monopoly, she might have felt bad about finding that so instinctively creepy. Might. “You’re strategy is… different than your predecessor’s, Duchess.”

Uh. “Is that a comment on my appearance, Representative? We’ve only just been introduced.” Not even, since they refused to offer their name.

They bowed his head, the gesture less conciliatory than slimy. “You have …a forceful presence.”

Yeah. _That_ sounded like a complement. “Sure. I trust you’ve had time to review the documents my team sent you?” Her team being Nicz herding the necessary lawyers and accountants into order.

The Representative grinned. She’d probably erred by cutting short the unpleasantries. But Bo didn’t have time for this banthashit. “Oh, but of course, Duchess. I believe we can come to an agreement. If, that is, you’re willing to—”

The door slammed open, admitting one of her Nite Owls, Cela, who sprinted down the hall. Panting, Cela handed Bo a roll of flimsy and a heppabore leather box, bearing the calla lily of House Kryze.

“What is the meaning of this?” Demanded the Representative.

Bo didn’t answer. She was too busy fighting off panic. She didn’t need to open the box to know what it contained. She did anyway. Anything to put off reading the message a moment longer. There it was: her father’s ring, made for the occasion of her appointment as House Kryze’s first heir, right after her grandfather unified the system. Handed down to Satine, then Korkie. It should have been with him, on Coruscant.

Hands shaking, Bo opened the roll.

_The price for your nephew’s head is the crown on yours._

The Saxons’ sharpened gear was stamped over the words. The world retreated to the size of a single page.

She didn’t know how much time passed before the Representative shrieked. “Duchess!”

Somehow, Bo found her words. “My apologies, I must handle this. My Minister of Finance, Nicz Tallo, will handle things from here. I’m certain you will find her more than qualified to conduct any negotiations.”

“I will?” Nicz whispered anxiously in her ear. Silently, Bo handed her the datapad. The blood drained from her face as she read. “I mean, yes. Representative, please, come with me. We can discuss this further over refreshments.” Nicz descended from the dais to take the Representative by their elbow and escorted him out the side door to the less formal receiving room. If Bo hadn’t been consumed with panic, she would have spared a moment to recognize that was a good choice: Nicz wasn’t a Duchess. She could let the Representative feel like they had the advantage without losing respect, get them to let down their guard.

As it was, Bo had scarcely ordered Cela to follow after them before she was striding towards the main door, barely keeping from bursting into an un-regal sprint.

She heard yelling as she approached the doors. It continued as Bo slipped through, coming to a sudden halt as the furious woman being held back by the Protectors caught sight of her. Ursa Wren looked ready to bring down the galaxy on their unsuspecting heads.

“Release me.” Ursa demanded.

What felt like a lifetime ago, Ursa Wren had been her closest friend. She’d been a member of Death Watch at its inception, when Pre-Viszla was first recruiting under utmost secrecy. It had been more then that though - her friendship with Ursa had been the reason the Wrens offered her safe harbor when she was a frightened, newly orphaned child with a target on her forehead and a vanished sister. Her fostering on Krownest had probably made the difference between her path and Satine’s. They’d shared everything once, from a dream to inside jokes, to the reason Ursa glowed when she returned to Concordia with splotches of fresh paint on her skin.

But after Ursa’s father passed on as the War was blossoming into life, she returned home to take up the mantel of Countess and marry her artist. By the time her daughter had been born, they weren’t speaking. Bo’s fault, like so many of the things she was still trying to set to rights. She’d called Ursa a traitor and a sell-out and worse, and earned radio silence in return.

Since Bo became Duchess, their relationship hadn’t mended, exactly. But it was professional. Ursa joined in to take back Mandalore, and didn’t even seem to be harboring a secret desire to off her, which was more than she could say for the rest of the nobles, the government, and at least 40% of the general populace.

“Release her.” She said. The Protectors reluctantly obeyed. “I’d normally listed to whatever it is, but Gar Saxon has my nephew, and I don’t have time.”

“Saxon has my husband and daughter.” Ursa snarled. “Do you have time for _that?_ ”

It was just that kind of day, wasn’t it? Bo couldn’t summon enough surprise to sigh. “I was just headed to the war room. Walk with me?” She resumed her pace, trusting Ursa to follow.

The war room wasn’t far. It had been converted into an aggressively sunny conference room under Satine. And Bo, not having the time or money for remodeling, had simply loaded all the best strategy and data tracking software into the central holotable and dealt with the glare.

(Satine thought sunny rooms were good for the mind; Bo would rather have working eyes and windows that didn’t make her a sniper’s target).

She switched on the holotable, and leaned over it, positioning herself so she could keep one eye on the door and one on the wall of hexagonal panes of window glass. “What happened?”

Shaking with rage, Ursa began her explanation. “Saxon asked me for a meeting. He said he wanted to come to an agreement over mining rights. We were supposed to meet in the private room at Chef Vesoin’s in downtown Sundari — neutral ground. Only he didn’t show, and when the valet brought my speeder, he handed me this.” She held up a datastick. Bo was surprised she didn’t crush it in her gauntlet.

“Go ahead.” Bo gestured for her to insert it into the table’s dock. When Ursa did, a figure in armor popped up, frozen and holding Alrich Wren by the scruff of his neck. A little girl was nearby, tied to a chair, her mouth open in a shout, one leg extended in a kick. That must be Sabine. Just from the one image, Bo could tell she took after her mother: fury winning over fear. Bo started the video.

“Countess.” The figure said. His face was concealed, but the voice was obviously that of Gar Saxon. Not that a voice recording would hold up as proof. Ursa flinched as Saxon forced her husband’s face toward the camera, but did not turn away. “I have something of yours. What matters more, I wonder? Your husband or your heir? Which should I send you pieces of first, I wonder? That’s what will happen if you don—”

Sabine howled, a wordless cry too big for a child her size. When Saxon turned to glare at her, she shouted. “Lemme go, you meanie! Or Mama’s gonna kill you!” She hammered at the air with her feet, like she might somehow grow in an instant and kick Saxon where it hurt.

Saxon slapped his free hand over his visor. “Someone gag her.” Another fully armored figure moved into frame, and wrestled a gag over Sabine’s mouth as she attempted to bite him.

Alrich cried out. “Don’t hurt her!” Saxon backhanded him, and he crumpled. Ursa looked ready to jump through the screen and strangle the worthless bastard who dared lay a hand on her family.

The other figure eventually succeeded in gagging Sabine. Even so, she continued to make muffled noises and kick.

Finally, Saxon resumed his monologue. “As I was saying. They’ll come home in pieces, one by one if you don’t do as I say. ” He paused long enough that it stopped being dramatic. “Have Bo-Katan Kryze arrested by the Empire. You have twenty-four hours.”

The feed went dead.

And Ursa had come to Bo instead?

She either had more balls than Bo ever suspected, or she was lulling her into a false sense of security. That was a question that could only be answered by time and action. She would insult Ursa by asking.

She voiced another concern instead, one that had been niggling at the back of her mind since the holo began. “I got a piece of flimsy and a family heirloom.” Why would Ursa have received proof of life and not her? It could mean Saxon didn’t really have Korkie. Or it could mean there was not proof to give.

“I can see why that would be concerning.”Ursa said flatly. “Does that affect whether you’ll help me?”

“Of course not. If anything, the recording will help. But first — Where’s your son?” She asked. “Is he safe?”

“With his nurse droid. Alrich took Sabine out to paint some rock formations. Tristan is too young to keep track of while my artists are focused.” A flash of love and overwhelming worry crossed Ursa’s face before the anger returned. “Now, how can it help?”

“Well, I’m not the slicer my sister is – was. Was. But I don’t need to be. I have the most advanced track soft-” Her gauntlet’s holoprojector chimed a pattern of identifiers. “-ware.” Her heartbeat picked up. That chime pattern was a priority call from a Kryze - not the house and its dependents, but the family.

Of which there were currently three members, one of whom was legally missing an presumed dead. Satine would never risk calling her on anything but the secure holo device (designed in an extra-legal Chandrillan lab with Alderaanian money, and tested with everything that tech-savvy Togrutan not-Jedi could think to throw at it) Bo kept locked in a biometrically locked secret compartment in her office wall. It could only be —

She jabbed the ‘answer call’ button repeatedly until the holo appeared. “Hi, Aunt Bo!” Korkie sounded far too excited for someone who had allegedly been kidnapped. “Boy, have I had an interesting week.”

If she hadn’t been leaning on the table her knees would have given out in relief. “I take it you’re _not_ kidnapped then?”

“Definitely not.” He sounded offended she even asked. “Thanks to your present, they just stole my ring when they couldn’t find me.”

“A sewing kit.” She said, disbelieving. “A sewing kit helped you escape kidnapping.”

Korkie shrugged like it was nothing. “You can do a lot with a needle and thread. Especially conductive thread. You see, every room is connected to the alarm system and I—”

“We’ve got a bit of a crisis going on here.” Ursa growled.

“Oh! Sorry. I’ll go now, then. I just wanted to let Aunt Bo know I’m ok. Sorry it took so long to call, I didn’t have call home privileges.” Korkie said, apologetic but not seeming any closer to actually hanging up. “And ask - if you find my ring, please send it back?”

“It showed up with a nice ransom note. Thank you for calling.” At least someone in the family thought ‘oh, hey, something dangerous happened. I should let Bo know I’m ok.’

Unlike _Satine,_ Ms. ‘Casually mentions she’s about to deliver aid to a war zone and forgets to call.’

Bo wanted so very much to tell him to continue, to soak in the brightness of him and banish her worry with the knowledge that, for now, he was out there, and he was alright. “Stay safe, Korkie.”

“I won’t!” He said cheerfully, and hung up. He couldn’t stay safe, could he? Not in the very heart of the Empire. But he could have done her the courtesy of lying.

“The tracking?” Ursa prompted.

“Right.” Bo brought up the analysis software and directed it towards the datastick. “This should tell us where it was made. I can’t promise he won’t have moved them, especially if it was on a ship, but —” The tracker spit out its results. It wasn’t on a ship. It was on the other side of Mandalore from Sundari, in the dome city that made up the Saxon Barony. “Is that too obvious?” She asked.

“Zoom in.” Ursa squinted at the map as it zoomed from planet to city. “That looks like a warehouse to me.”

“Zoom in.” Ursa squinted at the map as it zoomed from planet to city. “That looks like a warehouse to me.”

Bo did a search for the address. “Privately owned by — a shell company. Easily accessible to Saxon, but not legally his. It could still be a decoy.”

Ursa stared unblinkingly at the map, her fists clenching and unclenching. “It’s the only lead we have.”

Bo nodded. “I assume you’d like to keep this secret?”

“You assume correctly.”Ursa said stiffly.

Bo typed in a summons on her gauntlet, and pressed a button on the holotable to raise an exit disguised as a windowpane. Without hesitation, she leaped out into the air, and into the speeder waiting below. “Well?” She called up to Ursa, who stood in the open window above. “Are you coming or not?”

Mouth pressed into a grim line, Ursa jumped. When she landed, Bo closed the safety dome and hit the throttle. Ursa yelped as she was thrown into the passenger seat and they sped off over the city.

Just like old times.

“Why the secret exit?”Ursa asked, an attempt at distracting herself.

“You wanted secrecy.” She said. “I can’t go anywhere without Protectors these days. Ergo.” Bo took one hand off the wheel to gesture around them. She used the speeder to make unofficial checks on her ministers, mostly, so they wouldn’t get the idea the corruptions of wartime could continue. And if she ever needed to pay Satine a visit, this would be how she got to a ship.

“You don’t trust your Protectors.” It wasn’t a question.

As they exited the dome, Bo watched buildings turn to an endless expanse of desert. “I don’t trust many people these days.”

Ursa didn’t reply. There wasn’t anything else to say.

The warehouse, when they found it, looked like all warehouses used as a criminal front: abandoned. Only one door hadn’t been sealed with a super adhesive. So with a blast to the lock, they walked into a trap.

Inside was a maze of empty packing crates, stacked to the ceiling with one way forward in a series of turns designed to make them lose their orientation. Funneling them into a trap.

“This brings back memories.” Bo said. She edged around a corner, keeping her blaster at the ready and her eyes peeled for hidden lasers.

Ursa kept watch on their route of retreat to ensure they couldn’t be shot in the back without warning. “When Dad dropped us off in the canyons and sent the drones after us? Or the ones you put us through in Death Watch?”

“You helped design those!” Back in the early days of Death Watch, when they had been disgruntled, angry youths placed in charge of whipping a bunch of untrained, angrier youths by virtue of their titles while Pre Viszla plotted with — yelled at and then conceded to — his then mysterious sponsors. Even when Bo became his second in command, Pre Viszla never took her advice. Ursa had been better at seeing that would never change.

“I did _not_ tell you to add stampeding motts!” She’d always been the practical, comparatively cautious one.

“I maintain that was good real-world practice.” Bo kept her eyes ahead and searching for signs of movement as they continued through the maze. “Do you know how many times being able to evade a stampede has come in useful? Seven times! Seven!” Shockingly, most of those times hadn’t even been Jedi related, given their propensity for dangerous creatures.

Ursa made a stifled snorting noise. “And how many recruits quit after the first run on that course?”

Ok, sure. That had been… dozens. But, in her defense: “Only the ones who would have ratted us out. Though that might have been for the best.”

“That’s not what you said when I left.” Ursa’s voice was level. Monotonously, perilously level. “In fact, I remember you called me a sludge-diving, boot-licking failure of a Mandalorian and swore you’d never forgive me for selling out.“

Bo winced. She was still trying that new ‘owning up to her past failings’ thing, wasn’t she? Kriff. “I meant what I said when I said it.”

“Is that supposed to be an apology?” Bo was viscerally reminded that she had run off with a woman who’s family had been kidnapped to force her to depose her without backup. She’d had her reasons — but not exactly the smartest idea for a precariously positioned Duchess.

If only she weren’t absolutely abominable at apologies.

“No. This is.” She took a deep, steadying breath. “I’m sorry. You did the right thing, and I — didn’t. I was angry about everything, and single minded. I was wrong.”

“Well. That’s more of an apology than I expected.” Ursa said. “But don’t think you’re forgiven.” Bo thought there might be a hint of amusement under all the strain, but it was probably wishful thinking.

“Then why did you —” The maze dead ended in a wide, empty space.

“They’re not here.” Just about every swear in every Mandalorian dialect poured from Ursa’s mouth. Her reaction didn’t fool Bo. The tears threatening to spill over the corners of her eyes were from grief, not anger.

Bo saw the blink of a laser emitter in the nick of time. “Shit.” She grabbed Ursa by the arm and yanked her down into a crouch, and a bolt went through the air where Ursa’s head had been a moment before. The emitter kept firing, inching its aim down towards them with every blast. Bo fired, and missed the damned thing. Fired again, hit it. Dozens more red eyes appeared. Fuck. “We’ll find them.” She promised. “But first, we need to get out of here alive.”

The bolts, naturally, fired towards their escape. It couldn’t have been intended to kill them. Or rather, Ursa, who Saxon hopefully had assumed would go to anyone but Bo for help. Merely delay her. But that meant the emitters were nearly impossible to hit from a crouch. They would have to time their movements well.

While Bo was still focused on her breathing, trying to track the laser’s pattern, Ursa darted up and fired. She hit one, only for another to graze her helmet. Ursa wiped soot across her visor. “Now this — this is like old times.”

Bo grinned as she popped up to set off a shot of her own. She was about to reply when her holoprojector beeped insistently.

“Now isn’t the best time.” She informed her assistant, using her free hand to blast another emitter.

“I-I- wait! Don’t hang up. I had to detain the Banking Clan Representative.” Nicz rushed the words out so they blended together.

“What? Why?” Arresting the Representative was bad. “We need that loan.”

“Focus!” Ursa shouted over the sound of an exploding emitter.

Right. Deadly lasers. Bo could multitask.

“He let slip that his good friend Gar Saxon accepted a higher rate than I insisted on?” Nicz winced, awaiting censure.

A bolt glanced off her beskar, dangerously close to a space between plates. Bo could not multitask. “Ok, great. Keep him detained. Kind of dealing with something now.”

“Saxon’s taking hostages out of the system on the Representative’s ship!” Nicz spoke hurriedly, the words blending into one another. But Bo got the point.

“Have they taken off yet?” She demanded.

“Let me check!” Nicz leaned down to look a screen out of view. “No, not yet.”

“Keep them grounded. Use my code-” She gave Nicz the string of numbers and letters. “But make sure it sounds like its just because the Representative isn’t done yet.”

“Got it!” She chirped, and hung up.

Ursa shot a final laser projector. “You found them?” She gasped, breathing heavily from hope as much as exertion.

Bo nodded. “We have to get back to Sundari. Now.”

As if on cue, crisscrossing lasers came on in the path leading back towards the exit.

She sighed. “Would you rather deal with that, or go through the roof?”

“The roof, obviously.” Ursa said.

“I thought you’d say that.” Bo removed a grenade from her belt, armed it, and lobbed it at the ceiling. She’d missed the sound of explosions she didn’t have to file paperwork about.

(Would she have to file paperwork for this? Not if she didn’t report it, Bo decided.)

As the debris from the ruined ceiling fell around them, Bo flew towards the sky. Days like this were what jetpacks were invented for.

An only slightly less silent speeder drive back to Sundari later, Bo was tempted to just crash the speeder into a nice, oblivion inducing wall. Forget Gar freaking Saxon or even the Emperor, silence was her worst enemy. The ride back was long enough that the adrenaline surge from target practice had long-since faded. She clenched the wheel in a white-knuckled grip, eyes zeroed in on stretch of unending dessert before her in a desperate attempt to stay alert.

Ursa beat a steady rhythm into the passenger side door the whole way back.

It was a relief when they re-entered Sundari. In the city, there were other speeders to dodge as she sped back to Saxon’s last known location. He was still there, it seemed, blockaded in by several patrol ships from the Sundari police and the Protectors. Nicz sat in a speeder nearby, with a plain-clothes police officer holding a megaphone. The Banking Clan Representative sat in the back, hunched over crossed arms. They exuded the disbelief of the truly privileged that consequences dared knock on his door.

She transmitted her identification to the Protectors in the blockade, and made her way to land near the ship’s entry ramp. Her Protectors saluted, but did not move aside as she approached.

“We have a hostage situation, Duchess.” Lieutenant Delos, the Protector closest to her, said.

“Stand aside or I’ll shove your stun prod up your ass.” Ursa snarled.

Bo _hated_ being the diplomatic one. “We’re aware of the hostages. Please stand aside.”

“Are you certain?” The lieutenant asked.

Bo nodded sharply. “Yes. Give us, oh, thirty seconds inside, then follow.”

“Sir.” The lieutenant saluted, and stepped to the side, allowing her and Ursa to pass.

The ramp was lowered, a crew of droids keeping it forcibly in place. Looked like Nicz had gotten a crew in just in time. That woman more than deserved the promotion Bo had already been planning to give her.

The storage room at the top of the ramp contained only Saxon’s guards in nondescript armor when they reached it. But the man himself soon emerged, dragging a little girl whose arms were bound in cords by her collar.

“Sabine!” Ursa cried out.

“Mama!” Sabine struggled against her bonds, trying futilely to reach Saxon’s arm with her teeth.

“Hello, Countess.” Saxon said. “Imagine my surprise when I boarded this ship to find myself grounded. A delay in negotiation, they said. But I can see that wasn’t true.”

“Let her go.” Ursa demanded.

“Oh, Countess. I warned you what would happen if you went to her.” Saxon grabbed the little girl, Sabine, by her neck and leveled his blaster at her temple.

Ursa shot his blaster out of his hand without missing a beat.

Saxon swore and dropped the blaster. Sabine twisted out of his grip. Bo lunged forward, and tackled him. _Her_ Protectors were already in position, in a standoff with Saxon’s men. She was lucky. None of Saxon’s goons were stupid enough to break the standoff to shoot her.

Her momentum barreled him over. She was quick to take advantage of his surprise, jamming her hand into the space between his helmet and neck guard. He tried to buck her of, but the loss of breath gave her the chance to pin down his arms with her legs. She pulled off his helmet and tossed it away, wrapping her hands around his neck.

“All clear.” Lieutenant Delos’ voice asserted. Bo risked a glance behind her, and saw Saxon’s men cuffed or downed. Sabine cleaved to Ursa’s leg.

“Didn’t go how you thought it would, Baron?” Bo squeezed as she hissed. All he could do was glare. “Cuff him.” She ordered, moving to rest her knee on his neck so Delos could bind his hands.

“Permission to kill them now?” Ursa leveled her blaster at Saxon as Delos forced him to his feet.

“I’d like nothing more than to watch that.” Oh, how she’d love to put the blaster bolt in his head herself. “Unfortunately, as Duchess, I can’t condone angering the Banking Clan. As for Saxon, if I can convince the Empire he’s not worth their time, I’ll do my best to give you a trial by duel.”

Eventually. If her plans came to fruition.

“Look at you, thinking of the political consequences.” Ursa looked at her for a moment, as her daughter tugged on her free hand. Then, she nodded. “I suppose I can accept that.”

There was one more thing to deal with.

Outside, the Representative was throwing another fit. “How dare you touch a Representative of the Banking Clan! “See if you ever get your money now.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t know about that.” Bo folded her arms over her chest, standing so her shadow fell over them. “What do you think, Nicz?”

“The good representative agreed to the terms of our hospitality. I don’t think he read the fine print. We can’t _kill_ him —sorry again, Countess — but we could ship him off to an Imperial prison with the full support of the Empire and the Banking Clan.”

At least that answered the pronoun question.

“So, Representative, do you think we’ll be able to come to an agreement?” She asked. “Favorable to Mandalore, of course.”

The Representative clenched his fists. “Something could be arranged.”

“Excellent.” Bo said, grinning beneath her helmet. “Nicz?”

She turned back to find Ursa, trusting that Nicz would handle the details. Ursa stepped away from her husband, who was safe and sound, if roughed up enough to warrant the med-droid check he was undergoing, to meet her halfway. “Why did you come to me?” she asked.

As Delos guided Saxon down the ramp, radiating his fury and disbelief, Sabine slipped her hand out of her mother’s grasp and ran back toward her kidnapper to deliver a sharp kick to his kneecap. He’d believed himself invulnerable, and now here he was, getting kicked by a small child. He might not feel it through the armor, but that was the finishing blow to Saxon’s ego. He released an animal shriek.

“That’s my girl.” Ursa said proudly as she watched her daughter. She turned back to Bo, as Delos began to compliment Sabine’s kicking technique. “If there had been no other way, I would have turned you over. My family matters most. But I couldn’t let Saxon have Mandalore, if I could help it. He’s twisted our ideals beyond recognition You’re a better choice. ”

Not a high bar to clear, but she’d take it. Bo had thrown aside her family once, but she had come to realize that had been her greatest mistake. Loyalty to family was the first and most important Mandalorian ideal, and while family didn’t often mean by blood, Satine had never done anything worth severing those ties. She nodded. “Thank you.”

“We were friends once.” Ursa said, as though challenging Bo to contradict her. Sabine ran back, grinning gleefully, and jumped into Ursa’s arms.

For once, Bo’s smile was genuine. “I’d like to be again.”

“Maybe. Someday.” Ursa hefted her daughter, and returned to her husband. Someday. Today, an ally. Someday, friends. Someday, maybe, she could repair the damage she’d done.

Nicz popped up at her elbow, as she had a bad habit of doing. “The Representative really didn’t want this to get out. 0.01% interest per year.”

“That sounds low.” Bo said.

“Low? It’s unbelievable!” Nicz exclaimed, finally having managed to forget she was terrified of Bo. Good. 

“I’m promoting you.” She clasped her hands behind her back, pulling herself up to full height. It helped her sound official. “How does Minister of Finance sound?”

_5 AFE - Concordia Coliseum: ushering in a new era, or about to dive into the abyss_

The new Concordia Coliseum had been an expensive venture. It might have generated protests, if it hadn’t created so many jobs. Still did, a few. Someone would always find something to protest. But its location on a still-barren region of Concordia and the promise of its use for a cultural revival limited their extent. When she’d released her plans for it, local news reports shifted away from the constant influx of _Bo-Katan Kryze has No Business Being Duchess_ rants that Imperial officials had many times offered to quash.

She’d refused. They weren’t wrong. She would likely never be universally beloved. But even Satine had never managed that, even without Death Watch in the picture.

_Mandalorian Unemployment Rates Near Pre-War Levels_ and _Battles to the Death and Mural Exhibitions Under One Roof: Is there Logic Behind The Duchess’ ‘New Dawn’?_

She could live headlines like that. Far from all her achievements, but Bo had come to learn that was how government worked. The girl she’d been was all bloodlust and ideals, with the skill for the former and none of the wisdom for the latter.

And today, Bo stepped forward to open the first annual Mandalorian Unity Games. The coliseum was filled with tens of thousands and the games would be broadcast around the system. It had been built in the chrome and glass geometric patterning that marked the most historic of Mandalore’s cultural monuments, with the amphitheater style seating dating from their most ancient ruins.

Satine had done away with settling disputes by duel. The old way had allowed for ambiguous judgments, with only a witness on each side. Bo had reinstated the duel, with an eye for oversight. Both parties must agree to duel, and on whether the decision would come with first blood or death. If an agreement could not be made, the case would instead be heard in court. The duels were to be held in public, under the watchful eyes of qualified judges, rather than only a witness on each side, and could be declared invalid if any rule were infringed. The two weeks of the Unity Games would be a test.

But combat sports and trials by duel would not be the only arena of competition.

Mandalore’s best athletes and artists, academics and speakers would also compete, albeit in smaller facilities built around the central coliseum. All channels save the official Imperial HoloNews and the kid’s cartoon channel had set aside programming or online live streaming for the events. The Empire’s officials had liked that detail.

Unity was one of the Empire’s favorite terms, after all. Along with Order. And Strength.

That unity might be intended as finding a middle ground rather than uniformity had never crossed their minds.

If Mandalore’s martial tradition of elite warriors could exist without driving her people ever towards their destruction, side by side with safety and all those other things non-combatants liked.

(She had delegated the organization of those non-combat events to a highly enthusiastic Alrich Wren, but stayed involved in the main combat events throughout the process.)

The opening notes of the games’ theme, composed by a New Mandalorian from Sundari, blared triumphantly. The lights swept around the crowd, dozens crisscrossing with increasing speed until they converged on her. She stood, viscerally aware that every camera was turned on her.

“My sister the late Duchess believed that peace was the greatest ideal we could strive for.” As it turned out, public speaking was a lot like throwing herself into battle. It was the one place she still strived to emulate Pre Viszla. If nothing else, he’d been able to talk people like her into anything.

“Infamously, I disagreed. She paused for laughter. Most of those watching in the main coliseum’s stands were closer to her ideals than Satine’s, anticipating the displays of prowess and bloodshed to come with palpable eagerness. “I stand before you today to usher in a new era that has long been in the making. Today, we honor our traditions. And today, we move forward into a new dawn.”

Bo couldn’t claim the title of Manda’lor — another one of those lovely stipulations in the treaty — but that didn’t mean she couldn’t strive to be worthy of it.

Her speech was intentionally brief. As historically she hadn’t been the greatest proponent of … anything but war, she would allow the games to speak for themselves. Drums built to a crescendo as the lights scattered to rest on points across the stands, illuminating dozens of fully armored warriors at the ready. They launched into action, diving to the floor of the coliseum or riding wires towards the ceiling, opening the games with a choreographed exhibition match.

The trial of Gar Saxon would follow.

“You know, I never much cared for junk food growing up, but after three years of navy rations, I think this is the best thing I’ve ever tasted.” Korkie stuffed a filled breadstick in his mouth. He had managed to get leave from the navy for the games, after the oversight officials realized the optics having her heir standing by in full formal uniform would provide. She didn’t think they’d counted on him dripping garlic-taro sauce directly onto his rank insignia.

Korkie had settled well into his position as liaison officer aboard the Destroyer _Ultimatum_. It was a position where he rarely had to shoot anyone who didn’t try to shoot him first. An assignment that was both aided along by his pretending to be a terrible shot, and helped him maintain that facade. As for how he felt about negotiating surrenders… “I’m preventing bloodshed,” was all he would say about it.

“If that’s your definition of junk food, I have a few words for my dearly departed sister.” She said. If Satine had really been dead, Korkie would have tried to throttle her on the spot. As it was, he rolled his eyes and kept chewing. “Have a Unity Games branded chocolate beignet or ten. This is a celebration.”

Her favorite bakery on Kalevala had gone out of business during the war, but its owner had been quick to apply for a recovery stimulus loan, as she found out when the list of caterers came to her for approval. After this, they, and dozens of other small businesses would see their loans wiped out, and even have a chance to expand. Or so Nicz had explained.

“My CO would sense me eating that much sugar from across the galaxy and invent teleportation so he could come here and chew me out.” Korkie shuddered. She reached over to ruffle his gelled regulation-cut hair and he made a face, reminding her of when he’d been a child, before everything.

The door into the box opened. Bo drew her blaster as she turned.

“What a charming family tableau.” said Tiber Saxon, Imperial Commando and the ass who would become head of Clan Saxon when the Countess Wren killed his brother. He wore his plastoid stormtrooper armor, rather than the beskar it would only have been respectful to wear. He sneered at her, and looked Korkie over critically. “I believe that’s an infringement of the naval code.”

Bo holstered her blaster with greater reluctance. This was one of those times where she missed being part of an extra-legal vigilante organization.

Korkie shrugged, unconcerned. Here, he would always outrank Saxon. “I’m on leave. Captain Karson can yell at me about it when I get back if he wants.”

“I see. That _will_ go in my report.” Saxon had probably volunteered for the role of turncoat tattler.

The audience holocam returned to focus on the royal box and Korkie waved cheerfully into the camera, not bothering to hide his smeared insignia. “Go right ahead. I’m still great propaganda.” So long as he didn’t strip for the camera, Korkie would still be the Imperial Navy’s golden boy.

“Yes. We’ll see how long that lasts.” Tiber Saxon said stiffly.

“Then enjoy the festivities while you can.” Bo said, watching him out of the corner of her eyes as the performers simultaneously crossed their ceremonial blades in an echoing clash. “The closing melee alone will have five hundred participants. We had to pre-select them from a pool of twenty thousand applicants.”

“I’m looking forward to watching it. Aren’t you, Aunt Bo?” Korkie smiled at her innocently.

She nodded back, ignoring the festering sore glaring at her back. “Yes, it should be quite the spectacle.”

“Are you not participating in the melee, Duchess?” Saxon asked, like they were waiting on the next course at dinner and not for his brother to prove his guilt with his death.

Or like he was hoping for the chance to do away with her himself where it could look like an accident. Going out there would be asking for assassination. Even in single combat, enemies and opportunists would jump at the chance to do her in. She wasn’t _that_ stupid. Her Nite Owls and Protectors would have to prove the honor of Clan Kryze for her. She missed the days when her enemies just tried to kill her outright.

Bo forced a laugh. “Naturally, no. I wouldn’t want to sweep the competition. Perhaps now you’ll have a chance.”

“Oh, I’m not participating in this sham.” Saxon said. “I’m here to laugh when my brother wins.”

She thought he was severely overestimating his brother’s talents. Particularly after two years under house arrest.

The audience burst into applause as the exhibition came to a close, roaring with an approval she’d scarcely dared hope for.

“And now, for the first officially sanctioned trial by duel in twenty years!” The announcer, a fast-talking excitable reporter, exclaimed. “Baron Gar Saxon stands accused of kidnapping of Countess Wren’s consort and Viscountess Sabine, and treason for the attempted kidnapping of Marquess Korkie Kryze of Kalevala, Lieutenant in the Imperial Navy, recently awarded a Distinguished Service Medal for his negotiations on Gorse.”

“One title was more than enough.” Korkie grumbled low enough that any nearby microphones wouldn’t be able to pick it up.

But not low enough that Tiber Saxon didn’t. “Not proud of your accomplishments, young Kryze?”

“The announcer spent more time introducing me than your brother, and I’m just sitting here in a box, not the one accused of treason.” Korkie said. “You’re not upset?”

“I have more important things to worry about.” Saxon said without intonation.

Bo raised her brow at that, even as her hand tightened its grip on her blaster. “Your brother’s about to die. I’d hope so.”

“The duel will be to the death.” The shot of a cannon went off, and a red flag dropped to the ground between the combatants. As it settled on the ground, Ursa and Saxon began to circle each other. “And they’ve begun!”

To make the duel a true test of skill, blasters would only be allowed if the duel came to a draw after fifteen minutes. Jetpacks, on the other hand, were encouraged.

Saxon activated his and shot into the air, and Ursa followed. He turned, and threw a short vibrioblade at her. Ursa twisted in midair so it glanced off her vambrace. He accelerated to crash into her, and they flipped end over end, grappling, until they broke apart, Saxon fleeing across the stadium.

Ursa caught him, a sword-length vibrioblade of her own in hand, and he met her with a second, longer blade. Their exchange brought them to the ground, Ursa swinging her blade at a speed nearly too fast for the eye to follow, driven by righteous fury. He met her blow for blow, until he seemed to overpower her. Only for Ursa to feint, aiming to stab him through the neck. Saxon jerked out of reach and kicked her in the breastplate, sending her skidding back. He launched back into the air.

“Saxon does know using up the time limit would favor the Countess, right?” Korkie asked. “She’s a sharpshooter and he’s all muscle.”

“It’s possible he just wants to go out as dramatically as possible.” She whispered back, low enough Saxon shouldn’t be able to hear from where he leaned against the back of the box. “His arrest damaged his honor and threw his family’s into doubt. Even if he won, his leadership is worthless now. Losing well would take the scrutiny off his brother.”

Korkie pulled a face. “That’s stupid.”

“Oh, he’ll take a chance if he gets one. But Ursa has more reason to win.” Bo clarified. “Didn’t Satine teach you this?”

Saxon continued to engage and dodge as the minutes climbed. He shook his head.

“Aunt Satine barely taught me to defend myself. If she’d had her way, I never would have learned to fire a blaster.”

“Careful. Officially, you couldn’t hit the broad side of a blurrg.” She reminded him.

He shrugged. “Officially, I do know how to pull the trigger. I just shouldn’t.”

The buzzer went off. Ursa’s shot blasted through Saxon’s chest, and the momentum carried him up to crash into the ceiling. She’d drawn her blaster so quickly even Bo hadn’t seen her move.

He dropped in an almost graceful arc, and time seemed to slow with his silent fall.

Until Saxon’s body slammed into the ground with an echoing thunderclap. Had he survived Ursa’s final blow, the fall would have finished him off.

The stadium burst into deafening cheers. Bo applauded along with them. Until the surviving Saxon brother turned to leave. “Baron Saxon. I trust you won’t make the same mistakes as your brother.”

The younger, and now only Saxon paused to meet her with an entirely blank expression. “No. You’ll find me a far more patient man.”

She wouldn’t know what he meant for over a decade.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: the fluffiest thing I've ever written and the characters people are actually here for
> 
> [my tumblr](https://isabilightwood.tumblr.com/)


	4. It Takes a Village to Raise a Skywalker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Naberrie (Skywalker) twins celebrate their fifth birthday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is unlikely to update quite this quickly. I like to have a buffer chapter for this fic, and I'm pretty early on in chapter 6 right now. I happened to be pretty close to wrapping up both ch. 4 & 5 when I got back to this. The long hold up on this was the Padmé scene in this chapter. But I finally read Queen's Peril on Nov. 1st, and it was suddenly much easier.
> 
> SO -- I only have one friend who has kids, and she has three girls. We also have more info on Leia than Luke in canon thanks to Claudia Gray. I haven't interacted with any small boys since I was 17 and a counselor at the local zoo camp, many moons ago when Obama had just started his second term. So I went with Princess of Alderaan's characterization of baby Leia, and made Luke a bit more introverted (but just as much of a terror).

_5 AFE - Atollon_

Mama was yelling at the blue people again. Not the blue people like Auntie Riyo. The ones who buzzed and flickered when Leia snuck close enough to poke at them and weren’t really there. Leia crossed her arms over her chest and rolled back on her heels. She clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth, trying to make a very important decision. 

“Leia,” Luke whispered, tugging at her sleeve. “We’re not s’posseda bug Mama in the holo room.” 

Leia rolled her eyes. “So?” 

“We’re gonna get in trouble!” He whined like a baby even though he was one minute older. 

She rolled her eyes. “We never get in trouble.” 

“Maybe this time, we might. Master Depa said we’re spoiled.”

“Spoiled’s when Katooni and Petro forget to take out the trash. You can be rotting horned melons if you want. I’m not.” She stuck her tongue out and dodged past him into the doorway, only for Luke to catch hold of her arm.

Mama stood with one hand on her hip, scolding a stern-faced human man with close-cropped hair, only her face was sterner. More stern? Whatever. “You have to move — I don’t care if its your home system, you drew attention. Move your cell off Vardos if you don’t want to get yourselves killed. Yes, Haruun Kal. I’m sending you the mission details. Do not antagonize the governor for at least a month, please. I will not have a new cover for you before then.” 

“I swear, it’s like they all think they’re our only cell in the quadrant.” Mama flung up her hands as she turned to face another blue person, a woman with her hair pulled back in a bun just like Mama’s, wearing a jumpsuit unzipped to her waist to reveal a tank top. 

She laughed like she’d known Mama forever, before she’d had Leia and her dumb brother even. “Is this lot former Separatists disinclined to listen to a former Republic senator, or the generally lawless sort?” 

“Don’t I wish. Most Separatists seem to have seen my attempts to end the war on smuggled holos, and are at least willing to hear me out. And at least half the smugglers and pirates we work with are enamored with one or both off my Jedi.” There was that wrinkly faced Weequay who was basically in love with Uncle Obi and Aunt ‘Soka, so that was probably true. “These are patriots fighting for the freedom of their system.” 

“Help us but everyone else be damned?”

Leia held back a gasp — she knew her aunts and uncles were lying when they cut off mid bad word! Adults were such liars. 

Mama didn’t even scold her. “Exactly. And how’s the good Captain?” She waggled her eyebrows like whenever she was having a “Girl’s night” with Aunt Tine and Aunt Soka or Auntie Riyo, when she was around. 

Leia was a girl and _she_ wasn’t invited. 

The woman hesitated. “Tonra is… doing well, last I saw him.” 

“You haven’t broken up, have you?” Mama sounded concerned. 

“No, not at all. We’ve always been complicated.” A shrug the Force told Leia wasn’t completely honest. “After we found out you were all right, he went back to Naboo. But I’m a tad too recognizable.” 

“Is half of Naboo still convinced you were me all along?” Mama asked. 

“Surely not half.” The woman laughed, and it scrunched up her eyes. 

Now Mama was just talking to her friend. A friend Leia didn’t know. And it was supposed to be game time ten minutes ago. 

Mama always said it was only polite to ask for an introduction. 

Leia tore her arm out of Luke’s grip and went inside. Predictably, he didn’t hesitate to follow after. 

Luke liked to think he was a big kid who followed the rules. But she wasn’t the one riding a mouse droid through the mess, tripping half the base’s visitors. He forgot to invite her. 

Mama turned around immediately, surprised to see them when she shouldn’t be. “Leia! And Luke. Oh, no. Am I late again?” 

She nodded, using her best pout. 

“I’m sorry, come here.” She crouched and held out her arms. Leia and Luke went into them. 

“Who’s the lady, Mama?” She asked. 

“This is my oldest friend, your aunt Sabé.” She said, angling Leia towards her as Luke continued to hide his face. 

Leia was more friendly. She waved and gave her best polite smile. “Hi, Mama’s friend.” 

It would be nice if she could get more than her eyes above the holotable, but Mama couldn’t pick her up anymore. But her Aunts and Uncles all could. Leia didn’t get it. She could pick herself up for a few seconds, when med-i-ta-tion got so boring she managed it for a few seconds and then fell asleep. 

“Himamasfriend.” Luke mumbled into Mama’s skirt. He always got shy with new people. Even with other younglings, like the tiny Twi’lek Uncle Obi brought back last month — though he was boring and did nothing but drool. 

“Bye mama’s friend.” Leia tugged on Mama’s hand. She could talk to her friend later. “You promised we’d play the star chart game.” She’d promised. 

“I think I’m being dragged away.“ Mama said with a laugh. “My kids want to show me up at my own game.”

“I would expect no less from your children.” Mama’s friend Sabé said in the same tone as the one Uncle Obi told Leia was too cheeky for her own good. 

Leia took it as a complement, and grinned up at her. “I like your friend, Mama. She’s funny.” 

Not funny enough to let Mama keep talking to her when it was game time though. Thankfully, Mama’s friend Sabé got the picture, and signed off. 

Freed from his stranger-danger silence, Luke tugged at her skirts. “Come ooonnnn.” 

The star chart game was where they matched buildings and clothes and people to their home planets. And if they got something wrong, it explained the answer. The biiiiig white palace with the blue domes and waterfalls was Naboo, of course. Mama’s planet, that they weren’t allowed to go to even though it had sooo much water. 

It was “dangerous” and she was “banned” but it didn’t look that way to Leia. 

One day, when she was big enough to leave and go see places that weren’t just dry rock and giant spiders she wasn’t even allowed to play with, Leia would go see it for herself. 

“I’m gonna win!” Luke reached over the game template, nearly falling off his seat at their private apartment’s table to reach Ryloth. 

Nuh-uh. Leia was better at culture things. She needed to focus, and defend her record. “No you’re not!” 

Not even if Mama was leaning over his shoulder, explaining Onderon’s markets to him. Leia already knew about Onderon’s markets. She set to work with renewed determination. 

Twi’leks came from Ryloth - wait, no, those clothes were from Gatallan. Too bright and mis-matched to be anywhere else. She reached across the table to poke Gatallan, an it lit up a bright, friendly yellow. She whooped. 

A lumpy worm thing with patchy yellow-green skin came up next. But it had eyes and a big gap thing that was maybe supposed to be a mouth. A pet maybe? But it was wrapped in a blanket. “What’s that?” 

Mama moved over to stand behind Leia, squinting at the holoimage. “Oh, that brings me back. That’s a baby Hutt. A Huttlet.” 

“Hutts have babies???” Leia shrieked. Ew ew ew, bad. Wrong. “But they’re evil!” 

“Everything has babies.” Mama said, removing the tie from Leia’s hair and combing her fingers through it. 

“Uncle Obi said the fun-gi and plants in the garden copy themselves.” A little indoor garden, for an “emergency food supply,” though Leia had seen pictures of plants covering whole planets. “Like Uncle Rex and Kix.” 

“Those still start out little.” Mama pointed out as she began to braid. Leia decided to allow it. 

“Where did you meet a baby Hutt?” Luke asked. 

“I didn’t. Your father did.” That peaked both their interests. Even though Mama sounded sad. 

Mama didn’t usually want to talk about their dad. 

Luke came around the table and forced Leia to scoot over and share her seat. 

“Tell us!” They chorused. 

“It was right after he took on your Aunt Ahsoka as a student. They got the call that the Huttlet had been kidnapped,” Leia gasped. Luke clapped his hands over her eyes, and she had to shove them off. “The Huttlet’s father controlled some important trade routes, and he was going to turn them over to a bad man if they didn’t get him back…”

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was Obi-wan’s turn to convince the twins the Force had not decided to give them unlimited energy reserves beginning that day, and they did, in fact still need to sleep, same as any other human. They would be sleeping in his bed, assuming his bedtime story worked, since Padmé was expected to be in her meeting with Bail and Mon Mothma through the night. 

Obi-wan, as was far too often the case, would not be sleeping. 

Thankfully, Yoda had blessed — or possibly cursed — his upbringing with stories from across the ages and worlds of the galaxy. Those stories were usually enough to put the twins to sleep. “The Masters brought back many fantastic things from the market. Juicy Jogan fruits and fresh flaky pastries, shiny new gadgets and tools. Baskets full of everything he could imagine, and some things he couldn’t. Once, the eldest Master even came back with a three-legged Anooba that snarled and snapped at first, but could soon be found racing around the gardens, happily chasing flutterflies, or with its head resting peacefully on that same Master’s lap.” 

“Can we have a three-legged Anooba?” Luke asked, with the drawn out syllables of one trying not to sound tired. 

They most certainly could not. “Ask your mother. Shall I continue?” 

“Stop interrupting!” Leia reached across him to smack her brother in the arm. 

He was not sure why Luke and Leia had designated him their favorite bedtime storyteller. His voices were no match for Yoda’s, though he supposed it would be an abuse of Force ghost privileges to summon Yoda every afternoon nap or bedtime that it was his turn to put them to bed. 

Besides, he found he rather enjoyed it. 

Anakin — the same bolt of pain as always bisected his heart at the thought of the name, failing to grow muted over the years — had been much worse. 

“The Youngling thought the market must be a wondrous place to contain so many marvels, and moreover to share them with visitors. When he asked the Masters, they told him how people came from all across the galaxy, different races and creeds, to trade the fruits of their labor at the market. It was always full, the stalls overflowing with their bounty, customers bartering to get the best deal.” 

Luke scooted closer, yawning, and settled his head into Obi-wan’s elbow. “What’s bartering?” 

“’Member when Mama said we could play if we practiced spelling for thirty minutes and I got her down to fifteen? That’s bar-ter-ing.” Leia explained, quite well in his opinion, her mind far ahead of her continued inability to pronounce the word three, which Luke refused to let her live down. “Can we get on with the story now?” She pulled impatiently on his beard. 

“Oh. Ok.” Luke nodded into his robes. 

Chuckling, Obi-wan continued. ‘The Youngling heard their tales, and wanted to see the market for himself. So one day, he snuck into the back of the delivery vehicle and it carried him out into the city.” 

ome to think of it, it probably wasn’t a good plan to be giving them ideas. It hadn’t been so long since the last time Katooni and Petro tried to sneak off planet. He suspected the main reason the attempts had tapered off was had to do with the promise of legitimate trips for good behavior. He was not looking forward to the day the twins decided they were old enough. 

“He was carried all the way out to the market, past tall buildings and sprawling hills the likes of which he had never seen. Finally, they came to a clearing filled with tents of all sizes, and so many more people than the Youngling had imagined in the entire galaxy. He got down, and spent some time staring. There were stalls overflowing with fruits, hawking samples of dishes cooked on site the smell of which set his stomach to rumbling, cloth in a seemingly unending variety of patterns and colors, and many more things that seemed to have no purpose. Where should he even start?” 

The story didn’t take place on Coruscant, which was much the reason why he could bear to tell it. He suspected an allegory, as the city-planet had been no less overcrowded nine hundred years ago. 

“Food, obviously.” Luke said, simultaneously sleepy and self-righteous. 

“The youngling thought so to, and walked up to a stand and reached out to take a ripe, juicy looking meiloorun.” Master Yoda had always chosen a different stall, changed the details of his stories, to suit his audience. Obi-wan thought it only fitting that he continue the tradition. 

The door across the hall eased open, Satine returning from her latest mercy mission. Trying to be quiet so as not to alert the twins, but Obi-wan could never mistake her presence. 

“Just as the youngling was about to take a bite, a tall scowling woman slapped his hand away, shouting ‘Thief! Thief!’ Everyone in the aisle, from the customers browsing the other stalls, to the shop owners. Two people in identical uniforms ran toward him, looking angry. 

Not knowing what to do, the Youngling ran, and ran, and ran, until he couldn’t run anymore. He took refuge in a shaded storage area, filled with discarded boxes and barrels. 

A little tooka jumped onto the nearby barrels. ‘Hello,’ it said. ‘Are you new?’“ Obi-wan attempted a silly, high-pitched voice, and while it was a poor, squeaky attempt, the twins laughed. 

“And the youngling said, ‘I’ve never been to the market before.’ 

‘That’s obvious.’ Said the tooka. ‘You can’t just take whatever you want. You have to pay for it. With credits?’ 

‘What’re credits?’ The youngling asked sulkily, rubbing the red spot on his hand. 

‘Well, you’ll clearly get nowhere by yourself.’ The little tooka’s tail fluffed up in pride as it offered to show the youngling around, showing him how to ask for samples and browse the shops while avoiding any more of the frightening loud people. But after a few hours, the youngling yawned, and realized he needed to go home. The Masters would be worried.” 

Obi-wan paused to increase the drama. “But he had no idea how to get home.” 

Leia gasped, clutching his arm. “Oh no!” 

Luke, having drifted off, said nothing. 

“The youngling told the tooka as much, but the tooka only laughed. 

‘It’s not funny!’ The youngling pouted. ‘I need to go home!’ 

‘Silly youngling.’ The tooka said. ‘The Force will show you the way. But I’ll come with you, if it will help.”

A fitting story for Jedi younglings, a lesson in trusting the Force, but abstract enough that they might learn something without protesting the learning. No wonder Yoda had told it to death, to younglings long past the right age. 

The youngling agreed to this, though he did not understand what the little tooka meant. Not until he stepped onto a moving stair, and simply knew he was going in the right direction. And then he knew to step onto the back of an empty cart, hiding from its driver, on its way back from the city. The Force warned him when to get off, and he rolled to the ground, the tooka jumping nimbly after him. 

He had to walk the rest of the way, what felt like miles and miles, but passed quickly as the tooka asked him questions about temple life the whole journey. 

Finally, they came across an ancient tree, bent and knarled and leafless. The Youngling recognized it - it was near the Temple, within the bounds he had been allowed to wander with supervision. 

“I know this tree.” The youngling said. “The temple is just over that ridge, but where’s your nest? Will you be able to find it?” 

“Tookas are never really lost.” And the little tooka ran all the way home. The youngling watched its tail disappear into the distance, smiling, and went home to face the Masters.” 

Luke was long out, but Leia’s eyes finally slipped closed as he ended. She was never one to sleep without knowing how a story ended, a habit that seemed likely to cause problems as she hovered on the brink of moving from childrens’ storybooks to longer fare. 

Luke had a fondness for numbers, and Leia for words. And yet, Luke was happy to sit still, while Leia was unable to stay put for a moment unless offered a reward for good behavior. Both of them so much like Anakin in different ways. 

Now to get them off his lap without having to repeat the process all over again. A feat more arduous then bluffing General Loathsom. Particularly with Luke trapping his arm. He heard muffled laughter from the doorway, and looked up to see Satine, standing in the doorway, having emerged from the fresher in her rooms. 

Satine finished rubbing her hair with a towel, and set it around her shoulers. Wearing only one of her thin, gauzy blue robes that were specifically designed to torture him. Obi-wan kept his eyes determinedly on her face. She gently slipped Luke’s head off Obi-wan’s arm, so he could shift Leia off as he made his escape to her rooms, where the little fyrnocks wouldn’t immediately awaken and force him to undergo the process all over again. This time with more beard pulling. 

“Mandalorian bedtime stories have a lot more violence.” She said as she stepped inside behind him, indicating he should take a seat on the sofa. Unlike Obi-wan’s room, singular, Satine’s little apartment had a few pieces of furniture other than a bed. She sat beside him, leaving precisely enough space for both the illusion of propriety and the intimacy of which he was hyperaware. “Rightful wielder of the Darksaber this, don’t let the Jedi under your bed get you that.” 

He could only have assumed. “It’s one of Master Yoda’s. The tooka is the Force, of course.” 

“Oh, naturally.” She tossed her head, and smiled sardonically. 

“And you’ve survived another mercy mission, I see.” 

“Being splashed with paint for daring to question the work conditions at a construction company is a new one, I have to say.” She laughed like it was just another day. And paint incidents aside, it was. Gone were the days when her position allowed her to lecture whoever offended her that day without consequence. Admirably, albeit worryingly, it had only made her more bold. “I just managed to get the last of it off.” 

He reached up to wipe a spot of white paint from behind her ear. “Not quite. Better than a blaster, I suppose.” 

Satine arched one sharply curved brow. “If we’re comparing how often we get threatened with blasters…” 

Oh no, he would not take that lying down. There was a risk differential between relocating fugitives whose only crime was existing, and handing out med-kits. In the former, a certain level of barbaric blaster brandishing was only to be expected. In the latter, the hand-off should be simple, if one could refrain from antagonizing the local rulers. “How does merely dropping off supplies result in death threats again?” 

“I’m not merely dropping off supplies, I’m correcting any injustices I can!” She leaned toward him, her brows narrowed. 

“By yelling at people until they comply.” He mirrored her, realizing belatedly that a few scant inches separated them. 

“Mostly, yes.” Satine was nothing if not honest. “It worked better when my people had to listen to me, but just today I was able to disable the shock collars while the foreman was distracted.” 

Of course she had. “That was risky.” 

“Ah, yes, and how many Inquisitors have you fought recently?”Her expression said she had just taken his last dejarik piece. 

Ordinarily, she might have been right. But lately, either he’d gotten better at hiding, or the Inquisitors had another fish to fry. “None, actually. Just a few stormtroopers.” 

“Yes, that’s so much better.” She said flatly. 

“Less likely to finish me off.” He pointed out. 

Satine let a hand rest gently on his chest. “Good. I prefer you breathing.” 

Obi-wan raised his own hand to cover hers. It was cold, but warmed him to the core. “I feel rather the same way about you.” 

He let his forehead rest against hers. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Thank you, Master Luke.” Doc said, as Luke finished rewiring his arm, which had been torn out accidentally by an injured Wookie. Ahsoka checked his work at every step, of course. Shoddy wiring on their best med droid would be bad, especially now that Kix was at the University in Aldera City. Not that Luke really needed the help. 

He was like Anakin that way. 

“Remember to ask for help with patients that are bigger than you.” Luke patted Doc on his arm, offering a four-going-on-five year old’s version of sage advice. 

“I will be sure to.” Doc promised as he trundled off on his way back to the med-bay. Luke hummed happily, and turned back to the mouse-droid he was building from scratch and began singing the mouse droid jingle, “mouse droids, mouse droids, mousy-mousy mouse droids, not a speck of dust can every escape a mouse droid.” On repeat. 

He liked when Ahsoka let him work on the droids. 

She knew he would like it more if she let him work on the ships with her, but no way in the galaxy was Ahsoka letting a four year old touch the Morai. Not even a youngling as brilliant as Luke. He might have inherited his father’s mind for mechanics, but who was to say he hadn’t also inherited his talent for destroying ships? 

When he finished building Padmé a new protocol droid — so she could trade it to Bail for the return of C3PO — she might consider letting him work on one of Obi-wan’s stolen Imperial shuttles. That way, the first dozen or so times he blew something up, it would only waste the Empire’s money. 

She replaced her goggles and rolled under her ship, setting the pliers back to the exposed wiring where a lucky TIE fighter scored a hit. Only a few seconds later, Luke rolled underneath, hitching a ride on his droid, lying flat to fit. 

“So it can remember me.” He said. “And a voice box, so we can talk and it can tell me when Leia’s having fun without me.” 

Oh no. He was being creative. How very likely to result in explosions. The Morai would have to wait. “Show me what you want to do first, ok?” 

“Ok!” Luke pushed off the bottom of the ship and sent himself zipping back out at top speed. Sometimes Ahsoka missed being so young aerodynamic. She peeled herself out more slowly. 

Luke was back by the mouse droid, tools in hand, rolling slightly back and forth in his exuberance. “I can add more slots for RAM here,” He pointed to an empty spot on the side of the casing. “With a circuit connecting like this.” He traced a path to link it to the motherboard. “I want it to have enough memory that I can remind Leia about everything silly she does forever.” 

Not yet five years old, and already making his own spyware. She’d be concerned, if all his adult influences weren’t constantly discussing espionage in front of him. He thought it was normal, and there wasn’t much of anything she could do about it. 

So why not go along with it? Harmless fun, as much as there was such a thing for a youngling in a secret rebel camp. “You’ll need to increase the storage available on the harddrive as well.” 

Luke thought about it for a second and nodded sagely. “And if I take out the vacuum, the voice box can fit in right there.” 

And then it wouldn’t even be a cleaning device anymore. She was going to have to build a proper mouse droid herself, wasn’t she? But Luke’s idea did sound like more fun than she usually got up to these days. 

“And then it can —” 

“Leia, no!” Rex shouted. Ahsoka whipped around, zeroing in on the latest mischief. 

Leia careened by on her child speeder, wearing Rex’s stolen helmet— the old Jag eyes one, from the war, that he kept in pride of place in his room, since it was too recognizable to wear, and too sentimental to repaint — which was much too large for her to see out of. She was obviously using the Force to keep from crashing into the ships or anything stationary, but if someone stepped into her way, she’d be going too fast to stop. 

Ahsoka threw out her hand, pulling the speeder to a stop as Leia revved the engine in an attempt to keep it going. 

“Stop it!” Luke shouted, pointing an accusing finger at her with all the righteousness of a youngling. “You’re gonna overload the engine! I worked hard on that!” 

Leia removed the helmet, wearing a _who me_? expression. She had headphones on underneath. 

It was strange how the twins took after their father, despite never having met him. Leia had most of the way he threw herself into everything she did with the whole of her being, the passionate intensity in how she cared, Luke the slight disconnect from the consequences of his bright ideas, his talent for mechanics.

And their mother. Both twins would be capable of arguing the senate into submission within a few years, at most. If their ability to weasel extra dessert out of everyone around them was any indication. 

Ahsoka called the helmet over to her, tucking it under her arm as Rex caught up. 

“I would have caught her.” He panted, resting his hands on his knees. He was still in excellent shape even as his accelerated aging pushed his body into its late thirties, if somewhat softened. But keeping up with the twins gave her a run for her money. “Eventually.” 

“Would not.” Leia pouted, crossing her arms over her chest. 

Ahsoka put a hand on her hip, and angled herself so her shadow fell over Leia, trying not to show her amusement. “What do we say about touching other people’s things?” 

“Don’t.” She admitted reluctantly, even as she geared up a protest. “But Uncle Rex lets me touch his other things.” 

“His helmet is special.” She met Rex’s eyes as she spoke, and he shrugged, a half grin showing he was unaccountably embarrassed. 

“Why?” Leia asked. 

A lightsaber was her first instinctual example, but given the occasional need for appropriating a lightsaber, not the best one. “Would you take my headdress off my head without asking?” 

Leia shuffled her feet, her pout deepening. “…No. Not unless I had a really, really good reason.” It did have an emergency comm unit built in, so that was fair. 

“My helmet doesn’t have millennia of cultural tradition behind it.” Rex leaned over to whisper to her, not wanting to contradict her morality lesson. 

This helmet might not have millenia behind it, but it meant more to him than a headdress she’d changed the design of several times over. “Just a tradition as old as your culture. And more importantly, it matters to you.” 

“Ahsoka.” Rex said softly, his hand reaching up to brush a smudge of machine oil off her lekku. She shivered at the touch. Rex, remembering himself, snatched back his hand, placing it instead behind his head. Pretending nonchalance, and exuding sheepishness. 

She caught his other hand in hers, and squeezed, looking into his eyes until he stopped trying to look away. 

“Yuck.” Luke pulled a face. “Stop it. You’re being Mama’s gross mushy novels again.” 

“Shh, Uncle Rex thinks no one knows, remember?” Leia whispered loudly, which did nothing to help her cause. 

Ahsoka shoved Rex’s helmet backwards onto his head in the middle of Leia’s sentence, hoping to distract him. She held the top down firmly as his hands raised to fix it. 

“-Soka what the kr - er.” Rex caught himself mid-swear. Not that their efforts mattered much, with Katooni’s language. 

Luke’s lower lip jutted out. “That’s stupid.” 

Leia stuck her hands on her hips and hinged forward stubbornly at the hips. “It’s romantic.” 

“I can hear you.” She reminded them. 

“What’s romantic?” Rex asked, removing his helmet as Ahsoka let up the pressure. 

“Nothing.” She said quickly, challenging Leia to contradict her. 

Leia harrumphed, but said nothing. 

Luke, on the other hand, curled his hands into fists and narrowed his eyes as he whined, “Are you gonna help me with my droid or not?” 

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kanan — really Uncle Kanan, but nineteen was too young to be an uncle, so the twins only called him that to his face when they wanted to annoy him — was either a lot of fun, or no fun at all. According to the twins, at least. Particularly whenever he sensed them crawling through the ventilation ducts again, and removed them through one of the poorly secured grates. 

(They’d tried better securing the possible entry ways, but all it did was make the force sensitive miscreants harder to retrieve.) 

Master Obi-wan liked to joke that Ahsoka was secretly giving them pointers. But, as she always responded, Ahsoka hadn’t been able to fit since she was Kanan’s age. Personally, he suspected Katooni. 

The Tholothian Padawan had shot up like a beanpole on Florrum, but seemed likely to stay wiry. Unlike Petro, who was determined to take full advantage of the new breadth of his shoulders. He grunted out drills to the younglings — none of whom were ready for their kyber crystals, by the frequency with which Gilin, Stara, and Hedala bopped each other on the head instead of taking their training seriously — between pull ups. 

Katooni, as usual, was over on the shooting range, floating around used ration packs and shooting them down with her blaster for fun. 

They were all technically Master Depa’s Padawans, since Ahsoka was still “not a Jedi” and Master Obi-wan was convinced anyone he mentored was doomed. In practice, the three Padawans were shared and in turn took on much of the youngling duties. 

Kanan was half-heartedly supervising Petro’s lesson, while trying to concentrate on the specs for his first official solo mission, which he’d finally be going on after the twin’s all important fifth birthday. 

(He’d been threatened unnecessarily with life and limb if he missed it.) 

Really, he was reminiscing about the tan thighs of the leggy brunette he’d hooked up with at the local cantina after stormtroopers interfered with his rendezvous with Ahsoka on the last mission Depa let him go on. 

This would finally be his chance to prove himself capable, move onto the independent missions a Padawan and all he could think was — Force, he needed a drink. 

He sensed the mirth of a pair of giggling twins in the ceiling, and needed a drink even more. 

When Leia started to cross over the grate overhead, Kanan pulled it down to hover in the air, the girl holding tight to the bars. She stuck her tongue out at him, annoyed at — once again — being caught. The pair of them would have been an incomparable terror without Jedi around to keep track of them. 

“Luke.” He called. “Are you going to come down on your own, or do I have to do it for you?” 

“I’m coming, I’m coming.” Luke whined, hanging his torso over the edge of the vent precariously, before flipping lazily to the floor. Leia hopped off the grate so Kanan could raise it back into place. 

“You’re supposed to be in this lesson.” He reminded them, though he’d barely registered their absence. As the only younglings with family on base — only Hedala’s family visited, the others given up or orphaned — and the obvious favorites, no matter how objective Master Obi-wan or Ahsoka tried to appear, they were always a little separate. 

And never scolded for missing the group lightsaber lessons when, like their father, their shear power levels were off the charts, which could be dangerous with other younglings. Private lessons worked better for that reason, even if it didn’t exactly help them make friends. 

“It’s boring.” Luke sprawled on his back on the mat. 

Leia crossed her arms over her chest and stuck out a bony little hip. “Petro just huffs and puffs at us.” 

Petro breathlessly called out a new form, and the pairs of younglings switched which was attacking and which defending. 

Since they were here, he should probably get them to join in. Then he could responsibly go back to pretending to work. “Tell you a secret?” 

“What?” Leia demanded. 

“What?” Luke, a beat later. 

And together: “Tell us!” 

He leaned in, putting a hand to the side of his mouth to loud-whisper, “If you huff and puff back at him, he’ll lose concentration and fall. I bet if you work with the others, you can take him.” He winked exaggeratedly. 

Luke and Leia exchanged a glance, plotting their new mischief. “Ok!” 

They ran off to begin their quest of making Petro fall to the ground in hysterics. 

“You barely need me.” Master Depa stepped up behind him, her hands clasped behind her back. 

“Don’t say that.” He was far from meeting the standards of a Knight, no matter what his saber forms or the number of scrapes he got himself out of. Most of those scrapes were his fault, a result of the ease at which he gave in to the offer of a bottle, or a flirtatious smile. “I still have a lot to learn.” 

“Yes, you do.” She agreed, and despite himself he deflated. It was one thing to know that about himself, and another for her to say it. “And so do I. So do all of us. I’m proud of how far you’ve come.” 

“I stopped them from making mischief by telling them to make more mischief. This time on Petro.” Fun for him, not so much for Petro, who was struggling to keep his head over the bar, red faced, as the twins made exaggerated grunting noises and sound effects with each blow and swing of their sabers. 

She half-smiled at that, a long rare sight slowly becoming more frequent. “Misdirection is a classic Jedi technique.” 

“I think its meant to be used for serious missions, not pranks.” 

“You have to practice somehow.” His master was entirely straight faced, but he could feel her amusement. Kanan felt momentarily better about one of his choices, knowing that. 

There was a thump as Petro finally lost his grip, the fall knocking the laughter out of him. Luke and Leia hi-fived each other gleefully and ran out the door, leaping over some of the other younglings when they got in the way. 

“ Hey, you two! Get back here! ” Petro shouted after the twins, as he collected himself  from the floor. He sent a pleading glance at Kanan and their Master as he chased after  them. Neither of them moved to assist.

\------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Times like these, Padmé thought her kids might be the most spoiled in the galaxy. Not in terms of material wealth, but in the frequency at which their whims were indulged. With a single pleading look, they could be riding around on a clone’s shoulders, supplied with a remote-control droid built from scratch, allowed to stay up an hour past bedtime. Padmé liked to say it was their various honorary aunts and uncles at fault, but truly, she caved just as easily. 

They got it from their father. 

It was, therefore, no surprise that an event was made of their fifth birthday. 

Luke and Leia insisted on baking their own cake. Of their various and sundry honorary family, only Rex was allowed to help. (Padmé, specifically, was banned, though it really should have been Satine, who once managed to explode instant noodles.Though, come to think of it, her twin cyclones would have welcomed an explosion.) 

This despite the fact that Rex did not know how to bake. The bases’ cooks could not help. They made gourmet ice cream as a hobby — very appreciated on a desert planet — but bread always came in just-bake tubes, unless Padmé went on a stress baking spree and made enough five blossom bread for the whole base. Obi-wan and Depa technically knew the basics, from some class for Padawans back in the days before the war that seemed to have boiled down to a random assortment of life skills in case they were stranded on a mission. 

Padmé remained unclear how baking fit in. 

But the twins had decided Rex looked like he should know how to bake. And so a Rex covered in flour and puzzling over a menu was now a common sight. After a few initial disasters, he wasn’t half bad. 

On the bright side, she got to sit back, relax, and watch the antics unfold while sipping martinis. 

A shaded covering had been put up over an outdoor area, and a hose set up to splash the children with. Or possibly her, given the heat. She stayed inside most of the time for a reason. But if Luke and Leia wanted an outside party, they got an outside party. A few of the other younglings were playing a game of stop-go, with the one who was “it” sensing whether someone moved on a stop through closed lids. Somehow, they’d dragged Master Bilaba into the game. 

Satine reclined on another folding chair, as decadent as though she were still royalty, fanning herself with a painted fan she’d picked up somewhere off-world, her martini glass hanging carelessly from two fingers.

Padmé stared at it longingly. “How do the children stand it?” 

“The better question is how do those two stand it. I’m merely fanning hot air in my face.” Satine snapped her fan closed and pointed it towards a pair who had no business looking so unaffected in robes and armor. 

At the table dragged out from the mess, Ahsoka sat with both legs crossed on the bench, Obi-wan with one, neither of them capable of sitting like a normal person, in the midst of a rapid back and forth over something Master Yoda had once said. Master Yoda came up in conversation rather often for someone who was quite thoroughly dead. 

“Jedi: they can walk through nearly anything and come out looking fresh as a star flower.” She sighed mournfully. Even in her simplest, loosest white sundress, Padmé was melting into her chair. 

“Becoming a Jedi Master comes with an innate ability to show the rest of us up. Master Depa managed to look put together while in a medically induced coma in a bacta tank for six months. It was impressive.” Kanan, also seated at the table, but uninvolved with the conversation, sipped what he said was lemonade, but she suspected was at least half composed of filched gin. Despite being of age, he had the strangest idea he wasn’t permitted to drink in front of them. “She has yet to teach me her secrets.” 

“Has she taught you the secret of how not to expire of heat exhaustion?” Satine asked, renewing her fanning with increased vigor. 

He nodded, seemingly serious. “Meditation.” 

Padmé grimaced. “I’ll pass.” She said, as Satine expressed a similar sentiment. 

High pitched youthful squeals heralded the arrival of the guests of honor. At the noise, Kanan raised a datapad to record. For posterity, he said. Future blackmail material, Katooni chimed in, leaning over his shoulder to steal a mouthful of his drink. 

Rex emerged carrying the cake, himself caked absolutely head to toe with flour. Her little angels, on the other hand, had not a speck on them. But they were sporting identical wicked grins that made it excessively clear that both Rex’s situation and anything wrong in the kitchen was their fault. 

Ahsoka took one look at Rex, and doubled over laughing. Seeming, for once, like her younger self. Obi-wan covered his amusement by stroking his beard, Satine with her fan. Padmé didn’t bother, though what came out was far too close to a snort for her liking. 

Rex held the cake over his head as they grew closer, Luke and Leia jumping to grab for it, heedless of the consequences success would have. Ahsoka first took a picture — at which he expressed his betrayal — then took it from him, setting it down on the table. She turned to pat Rex down, sending clouds of flour everywhere, as Padmé was dragged from her chair by sticky-handed children. 

“Cake.” They chanted. “Cake. Cake. Cake.” 

Summoned by the promise of sugar, the other younglings abandoned their game and approached, jostling and pushing each other to take prime positions near the cake. 

“It should be edible.” Rex assured her, his ears turning increasingly red as Ahsoka continued to divest him of flour. “Despite their best efforts.” 

“We appreciate your sacrifice, Rex.” Padmé told him, attempting to settle her children into their seats as they continued chanting. Once she had them settled, bouncing in place, she reached for the knife. 

The cake was, at least, recognizably cake-like, if frosted unevenly, with what looked like an entire tube of edible purple writing gel scribbled randomly over the top. Padmé made sure to cut two slices as close to identical as possible, and let Luke and Leia choose between them. Still, they insisted on switching four times before Luke finally dug in over Leia’s arguments. Leia whined at the offense and tried to poke him, but couldn’t manage to reach him around Padmé. 

By then, the other younglings were getting impatient, even as they tried to be Jedi-like and not fidget. Padmé busied herself with supplying them with slices before the younger ones got teary, with Depa passing them out. 

Once all the younglings were happily devouring the goopey monstrosity, she took her seat. Luke promptly scrambled into her lap, frosting all over his face. He was almost getting too big for that, which she did not like to think about. 

Meanwhile, Obi-wan was patiently attempting to wipe Leia’s face as she laughed an squirmed away. And Ahsoka had de-floured Rex as much as she could without water or a sonic. His hair was still mostly white, instead of blond. 

He chuckled. “I think if anyone over fifteen tries that, they’ll immediately crystallize into a pillar of sugar.” 

Thankfully, both twins had finally passed the stage where they offered spoonfuls from their plates to the nearest adult, so Padmé did not need to test that theory. “I’ll take your word for it.” 

“Yep, don’t eat that.” Petro looked distinctly green as he pushed his slice away. 

Katooni’s elbow hit the edge of her plate, flinging her slice into the air. It landed on Petro’s head, which could not have been a coincidence. 

“I am going to murder you the second there are no impressionable younglings around.” He informed her as he wiped frosting out of his eyes. 

Luke tugged on her sleeve, looking up at her with his biggest, best puppy eyes. His plate was empty. 

Oh no. 

“Mama? Can I have another piece. Please?” 

This time, she was going to make an effort to enforce rules. “No seconds, you’ll be up all night.” 

“But it’s our birthday. We get what we want on our birthday.” “You promised, Mama.” 

Luke nodded. “Yesterday.” 

Outsmarted by her own children. She had promised, Padmé remembered now, when she was in the midst of a call, attempting to get them out of her office before Saw Gerrera said anything permanently scarring. It had been another rude rebuff, though it had been something of a surprise he’d even picked up. Usually, he only answered a call from Fulcrum, having guessed Ahsoka’s identity since she’d taken her call sign from his old frequency for contacting the Jedi. Better was not by much, but it was the difference between him disconnecting after a long bout of laughter and staying connected long enough to hear, if rarely listen to, a “please do not disrupt our operation by burning down the city.” 

Their argument was sound. She had no choice but to give in. “All right, but only one more. A small piece.” 

“Yay!” Leia leaned in to trap Padmé’s arm against her side, preventing her from making good on her presence, while Luke did an excited little dance. 

Ahsoka took pity on her, deftly cutting a thin slice onto each of the twins’ frosting-smeared plates. “They take after you. Little rebels.” 

“Oh, they’re little rebels all right.” She sighed fondly. “Rebelling against me.” 

When the cake was gone, out came the toy lightsabers. 

Like any good mother, Padmé was not exactly thrilled with the idea of her children training for war. None of the Jedi would have called it that, naturally. But she couldn’t look at her reports, and then watch Luke and Leia running around whacking each other with the toys Ahsoka had helped Luke piece together from scrap metal, and see anything else. 

Leia did a flip over her brother’s wild swing, and landed on her feet, squealing with delight. 

“Watch your back, Leia!” Obi-wan called out from the sidelines. “Oh well, too late.” 

While she was still celebrating, Luke did a twisting scissor kick into her shoulder, sending both of their toy sabers flying as they toppled to the ground in a pile of flailing limbs. Dueling devolved into a tooka fight punctuated by manic giggles and high pitched shrieks. 

One of the rare times Leia let her put up her hair in anything save a simple tail, and it was ruined after an hour. Luke’s as well, but he was happier to sit still if it meant there would be no stray hairs falling in his way. 

Padmé wanted to give them the golden, glittering childhood of her memories, and keep them there indefinitely. Her children deserved lakes and waterfalls and warm beaches, grass meadows with all the space to run as they wished. They deserved their father, chasing them while attempting to surf on the back of a shaak. No giant spiders just outside the small borders of their world, no looming evil waiting to tear everything away the moment one of them made a mistake. Not believing their father dead, when the truth was so much worse. They might not be leaving to join the youth legislature at the age of eight, but she knew she could only keep them safe for so long. 

Obi-wan waded in, and separated them by the backs of their robes. They kept trying to fling their hands at each other, eyes scrunched closed and giggling. 

“Is this training or a wrestling match?” He asked in that tone he used to pretend he was stern. 

Leia nodded enthusiastically in agreement. 

Padmé smothered a laugh behind her hand. 

Obi-wan noticed, and a mischievous glint entered his eyes. “In that case, perhaps you’d like to wrestle with your mother?” 

The others were outright laughing, even Satine, yet Padmé was the one he wanted to drag into exercise when her skin might boil off at any moment. 

“Obi-wan…” She trailed off in warning. 

“Mama can’t wrestle.” Leia asserted. “She just talks to people all day.” 

“Well,” Obi-wan said smugly, knowing he had won. “Are they right?” 

She put down her glass of iced tea and got to her feet with a toss of her head. “You’re in for it now.” 

They were not in for it. Padmé was knocked onto her backside as the twins overbalanced her silly monster walk and climbed over her like a jungle gym. 

It was as close to a perfect day as they came anymore. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: Chapter Fives 😉


	5. Fives

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fives gets an unexpected promotion and an extra helping of trauma, tries to make a difference anyway.

_O AFE - Coruscant, on the wrong side of the apocalypse_

ARC-5555, once but no longer known as Fives, received a promotion the day after everything went to hell. He stood at attention, blinking away the red haze that had descended over his vision, driving him to - to - to -

The Captain’s voice breaking as he explained Commander Tano was gone —

The voice like spiders crawling inside his skull telling him to kill the Jedi —

The Jedi were traitors.

_Kill them all._

A splash of red across his visor, a small figure stumbling, falling. A lightsaber dropping from nerveless fingers, flickering out as it rolled across the floor, its echo impossibly loud. A hole in the forehead of a youngling from a blaster set to kill.

ARC-5555 wished he were a droid, able to wipe the memories away. _Let them go,_ an almost-voice whispered in his mind. _You need not remember, you need only follow orders. You can be at peace_. But no— he was no droid. He was no number, save the number he chose for himself. He might never be forgiven, but his name bore the weight of many lost lives already. Droidbait. Cutup. Hevy. Hardcase. Ninety-nine. _Echo_. Fives would have to be a name that could bear the guilt of nameless dead. He would disrespect their memory if he retreated into numbers.

Fives did not know what had driven him to madness, or why he seemed to be the only one of the men —of _his_ men now — who knew this was wrong. Something had gone _wrong_. He had to remember. Because no one else would.

“Are you all right, Captain?” A trooper asked.

He blinked.

“Fine.” He said, though he was anything but.

Captain. What a joke. It wasn’t so long ago he, Echo, and Hevy were saluting Rex for the first time in the disaster of their first mission, armor still shiny. And now he was the only one left. The 501st’s senior officer. Captain by default.

There was no Commander.

Where was Rex?

The General — Darth Vader, he wanted to be called now. Banthashit if Fives had ever heard it — had shut down any attempt to question. Fives had still been too lost in the haze to push during his informal, impromptu promotion at the briefing after the slaughter. The General wasn’t acting like himself, but neither had Fives. Even so, he had listed the Jedi Council and the troopers in line for promotion ahead of Fives as deceased. His failure to mention Rex seemed off, like maybe the General didn’t know.

Or had forgotten how to care.

There was something clipped and cold in the General’s voice that made Fives struggle to remember to think of him as General Skywalker, who burned, bright and luminous, like every day might be his last, and not the _invader_ it seemed everyone had forgotten he hadn’t always been.

“Captain?” The trooper asked again — part of a new batch, the _last_ batch, shipped in to fill the gaps in their ranks, still lanky with youth.

There would be no more clone troopers. Fives didn’t need to ask to know what had happened to the boys in training, the infants still in their pods.

Decommissioned, like so much trash, an expense marked off the ledger.

There were gaping wounds to fill. Fives had been lucky to survive the attack on the Jedi Temple. (Hah. _Lucky._ ) Of the troopers he’d been closest to, Jesse and Tup were confirmed dead. Jesse in the attack on Master Yoda, but Tup went down early, without a blow. Like something burst in his brain at the order. Fives had seen it and, in the haze, marched on like nothing was wrong. And Rex and Kix were not so much missing as vanished.

Tup was the lucky one.

_(And before that — right after Commander Tano was executed. Fives tried to tell General Skywalker how sorry he was about the Commander, how much he’d always liked her. He’d scarcely gotten started, saying “I’m sorry about the Command—”_

_When his air was chocked off by an almost casual clenching of Skywalker’s fist, and Fives found himself jerked up onto the ceiling. “There is no Commander.” The General had growled. He stomped off, leaving Fives to drop to the ground, gasping, with scarcely enough time to catch his breath before the haze creeped in.)_

“It’s been a long day, trooper.” A long day. He’d trade that long day for a lifetime in the Citadel if it meant he could take it back. “What’s your name?”

The trooper saluted. “My designation is CT-67-2—”

“Never mind.” Fives sighed. Looking him over, Fives saw the trooper had yet to make any personal modifications - everything was regulation. Not too unusual for a shiny, but there was something in his eyes. Like he hadn’t remembered how to be a person. “Go get some rest.”

“Sir.” The trooper saluted, and left Rex’s — _his_ office.

Fives had no idea what he could do to fix this. Rex would have known.

That was a lie — but at least if Rex was there, he wouldn’t have been alone. Fives would be asked his opinion, but not expected to make the decision. Fives had been made an ARC trooper for thinking outside the box. But that was just interpreting orders creatively. He wasn’t expected to _give_ them. _Where_ was Rex?

He pulled up the service records database, punching buttons with more force than necessary. He searched for the Captain by name. The query bounced back. He searched by number. CT-7567 - missing. Presumed traitor.

_Traitor? Rex?_ Never.

He brought up Kix’s file. Same thing.

It didn’t make sense.

Unless.

Had they beaten the haze somehow? Had any Jedi escaped?

He searched for a wanted list. It was longer than he’d dared hope.

General Kenobi was right at the top. A wave of hot relief crashed over him, so intense he had to take his seat. It was the only good news he’d had that horrible, unfathomable day. But Kenobi’s last known location was Mandalore. As welcome as the news of his survival was, it didn’t answer his question.

Luminara Unduli, Eeth Koth, Quinlan Vos — none had been on Coruscant. Count Dooku was still on the loose. Bastard would never die. A quarter of the way down the list, he found his answers: Kit Fisto, Depa Bilaba, and Caleb Dume. Last known location: exiting Coruscant space. Master Fisto was believed to be travelling with several dozen younglings.

No clones were mentioned. But then, when had the Supreme Chancellor — the _Emperor_ — ever thought of them as individuals? Few people had, apart from his brothers themselves. And the Jedi. Rex and Kix might not be mentioned, but he knew. Call it his gut or the force doing him a favor for once, but he _knew_.

He could leave, try to go find them —

No, he couldn’t.

Fives thought of his men, sleeping in their barracks, unaware of how they had been used. They needed him. And what if it happened again? He’d be a liability.

He didn’t know how to lead, but the men — _his_ men, his _brothers —_ deserved a Captain who remembered they were people. After today, he couldn’t trust General Skywalker to do it. Rex and Kix were free. Good, at least a few of them were. Fives was the one left on the inside.

It would have to be him.

_2 AFE - Iridonia, resentment building_

Fives wished the Jedi hunts were the worst part of his job.

“ _There_ you are, Captain.” Commander Vul sneered. “You were supposed to make the rendezvous point an hour ago.”

“We had injured.” He said gruffly. Himself among them, but only a scratch that could be treated later. The line of fire along his bicep burned, but he’d been fortunate. Ten of his men hadn’t made it. Two whom might have had a chance, if their medic, a natural born human with little inclination for mingling with clones, had been given the time to treat them before the Commander ordered them to push on towards the prize.

Another clone trooper, Bravo, had lost his arm. He would be discharged with two weeks pay, a paltry thanks for a lifetime of service the Empire expected them to gratefully accept.

Vul scoffed. “If the Jedi escapes because you were dawdling, I expect you to take full responsibility.” He didn’t think their lives, clone or natural born human, were worth so much as a ten-minute delay.

“Yes Sir,” He saluted wearily.

Yet another rumored Jedi. Most likely a local reporting an outsider they wanted gone, only to find their own lives uprooted as the 501st turned out their homes in the search. Conscripted their children when no Jedi was found.

The attack by a local resistance cell had no bearing on whether there was a Jedi on Iridonia, but Commander Vul didn’t seem to have figured that out.

Vul flicked a spot of dust off his uniform as he stalked back to his speeder, muttering vulgar things about clones.

Fives signaled for the men to push on, accelerating his own speeder.

Months had gone by without a commander in the 501st. Fives had thought —hoped — it was because some part of Skywalker still mourned Commander Tano. The General had avoided him, mostly, save when handing down orders. Darth Vader didn’t feel like the General, even in the increasingly rare moments when he shed the black mask that told the galaxy of the Emperor’s favor.

Yet Fives continued to call him General in his head, like a memorial for a man still living. The General had been warped, somehow, into one of the Sith he’d once sworn to destroy. The least Fives could do was remember the man he’d been.

He could remember, but remembering didn’t mean he’d gone stupid. He saw what happened to those who questioned.

So he said _Sir, yes, sir_ , kept his head down, and lived another day. It was the only way to keep what men he could alive. Even when his armor was confiscated and replaced with plain, white plastoid. Even when ordered to refer to his men as numbers, not names.

They couldn’t order him to forget, could not patrol every moment of his off hours. Who would think to, if he was just another nameless, disposable face? There were too many captains among the stars. He spent his nights and leave days at the old haunts, haunted by dozens of faces so like those he’d lost, telling stories of heroes and pretending to drink. The pretending was important - the fuzzy, simple world of drink was too tempting. But he bought drinks for others, and bought their attention.

The stories were never of the Jedi, that would be a step too far.

The brothers he had left would have reported him in an instant, save those few and far between and dwindling who, like him, had realized what they’d done and chosen to stay. He told of sacrifices and triumphs and brothers lost to war. He told of men who deserved to be remembered, and asked how he could remember his audience. Usually, they told him.

If they walked away feeling a little more worth something, a little more like _people_ , than it was worth it.

Hevy would have started laughing and never stopped at the sight of him, at the thought that reckless, irresponsible, trigger happy Fives was the last of Domino Squad - all grown up, and a cautious, silly old storyteller at that.

Eventually, a commander had been appointed. Some fresh-faced academy graduate convinced his infantry appointment was a temporary insult. It had been temporary all right. The man hadn’t lasted a week. With the way the General picked off his commanders, maybe he was mourning her in a twisted way. Reopening the gaping wound of her absence over and over again.

There was no Jedi, of course.

Unless it was one of the children hidden under floorboards Fives purposefully passed over. But he doubted it.

Commander Vul had been confident enough in his intel to call in the General. Overconfident, that was.

If there were a Jedi, the General would have sensed them.

“You assured me a Jedi could be found in this backwater town.” The General paced before the Company, assembled in their ranks and saluting, his gloved hands clasped behind him. His cape billowed in the wind, strong enough to pelt Fives’ helmet with pebbles. “Arrogance has consequences, Commander Vul.”

Vul’s eyes bulged out as he turned blue, clawing desperately at his throat as he suffocated, dangling in mid-air. Even had he been a better man, Fives could have done nothing to save him. His hands dropped, going limp, his head lolling to the side.

Fives might have despised him, but the sight still made bile rise into his throat. He swallowed it down, unwavering in his salute.

With a flick of his hand, the General sent Vul’s body crashing through a nearby window.

“Take a lesson from this.” The General addressed the assembled men. “Do not fail me.” He let the silence stretch on. His taste for drama seemed to be the only thing he’d kept, in the transition. “Captain. Handle the clean-up.”

He froze in salute, unable to move until the General was gone.

_4 AFE - Tatooine, a used-up resource_

Fives found himself on Tatooine for the fifth time in four years, the sand finding its way through the cracks in his armor with every step he took, despite the utter lack of a breeze. If his armor hadn’t had its shoddy excuse for a built-in cooling system, he would have already cooked in his armor.

It was enough to make him understand what the General used to complain about at the mere mention of a desert planet. Not that he could share his discovery, even if he hadn’t been sent to rendezvous with a squad from another Battalion while the General dealt with a diplomatic trade issue at Jabba’s palace.

The Emperor must take a gleeful pleasure in torturing the General, to send him there so often when he clearly despised it. And especially when the idea of the General handling diplomacy was more laughable than his retirement prospects.

The objective was a pair of bounty hunters, who’d taken an exclusive contract to steal confidential information for Crimson Dawn. Another unit had been chasing them, and they dug their way into a cave and seeded the entryway with explosives. Since their orders were to bring the bounty hunters in alive — or one of them, at least — and they weren’t qualified for defusing and extraction, they’d called in for commando assistance. Fives was sent in to consult.

His first surprise was the identity of the unit’s leader, another captain. “Boil! I see you’re still holding in there.”

He hadn’t known Boil all that well, back in the old days. They were friendly enough — Fives was friendly with everyone who wasn’t a numa-headed asshole, especially his brothers — they’d just rarely been assigned to the same missions. It was also possible Fives had killed his best friend, which put a bit of a damper on their relationship from his end, even if Boil didn’t seem to blame him.

(If following a traitor’s orders unknowingly didn’t put him at fault, if he couldn’t explain why he’d followed orders that fateful day at the Jedi Temple, then why was he still following the orders of a traitor to the Republic?)

But there were only so many clones left in the Imperial army, much less clones who’d fought from the first year of the war. The filtering out had begun slowly, picked up speed as the ranks filled with volunteers, and, in greater numbers, conscripted from conquered planets. “Aging out” was what they claimed, though the eldest among them were not yet twenty, and Fives was older than many of those who had disappeared.

Some soldiers were “honorably dismissed” with a pittance of a retirement fund, just enough for a single economy class transport ticket, if they hadn’t saved their leave allowances. He’d seen some number of those off himself, hinting that Saleucami was nice, that time of year. Any time of year, really. Out of the way, inoffensive. A nice place to retire with a cheap plot of land.

He didn’t know how many took his advice, or how the deserter Rex “hadn’t met there, what are you on about, Fives. Never come on duty high again,” had taken an influx of brothers showing up in his neighborhood. But it seemed the least he could do.

The others, though - the higher ranked, the commandos — they vanished. Not like Rex and Kix, whose files were still available at high clearance, now officially traitors. Their files were deleted entirely from the system. Case closed.

As though they had never existed at all.

If Fives aged out, he wasn’t aging out alive.

Free of any superior officers to complain, Boil clapped him on the shoulder. “If it isn’t Grandfather Fives.”

“What?” He must have heard wrong. He was _not_ old enough to be a grandfather.

“It’s what the men call you. For all those stories you like to tell.” Boil said, and Fives continued to disbelieve - “ Just like an old man reminiscing. ‘Back in the old days, we painted our armor. We _expressed_ our _individuality._ Now get off my lawn.’”

“Shut it, I’m no older than you.” Actually, he was certain Boil was older by at least six months, if not more. “We’re getting on, but not _that_ quickly.”

“You know I’m just messing with you.” Boil laughed. A brother laughing was not a sound he heard often anymore.

Fives remembered a time when Boil was all protocol. “You’ve lightened up.”

“You’ve gone stodgy,” Boil accused.

“I’m the longest surviving officer in the 501st. That’s how I’ve managed it.” By suppressing every urge to do anything fun or outspoken in a professional capacity, an imitation of Rex on Umbara. He finally understood the choices Rex had made to protect his men, and he didn’t like it one bit. It sucked out a little more of his soul everyday. If he even had one left, after that day.

One of the troopers standing behind Boil shifted, and Fives was reminded that any of them could be looking for a leg up by ratting out inappropriate behavior. It was expected. Not like the old days, when they were all brothers. “What’s the situation?”

“They’re still in there. There are proximity bombs, from what we can tell.” He pulled up a holomap of the locations from the projector on his gauntlet. “Our only explosives expert set off one of the proximity bombs here, and half collapsed the only known entry point.”

“Could there be others?”

“We’ve scanned it with everything we’ve got. It’s a manmade cave, goes back half a kilometer or so, with two almost equal length branches.” Boil adjusted the holo to show how the tunnels were perfectly cylindrical until they tapered off slightly, and ended in a smooth wall of stone. Known bomb locations were marked in red. “Seems like the bombs go the first hundred meters, but… our expert was not as expert as his credentials claimed.”

Not an uncommon problem, with all these half-trained nats. “That’s what I’m here for.” He pulled out his binoculars, to get a feel for the situation himself. The bombs in sight looked close together for comfort, but easy enough for an ARC trooper to avoid. Unfortunately, this was a team job. “All right, I’ll take a team in. Boil, which three men do you want?” One of the troopers made a choking sound. “Not that one.”

“None of them.” Boil muttered, low enough the others couldn’t hear. With a sigh, he pointed to a few of his men, indistinguishable in white. “You three, with me. The rest of you, keep watch.” Turning back to Fives, he said, “I am the _only_ brother left in my unit.”

That said a lot about how well this was going to go. When they reached the first set of obstacles, he held up a hand in warning. “Follow my footsteps _exactly_. Or we’ll all be mince meat.”

“How will we subdue them, Sir?” The lead of the three troopers asked, stumbling over his own feet to round a crate.

“You may not use it often, but there is still a stun setting on your blaster.” What were those fancy academies teaching recruits these days? It took months to whip them into anything resembling a shiny’s shape. “Use it. I’ve got sedatives to keep them out.”

The trooper nodded, and stepped forward without looking, distinctly off the path Fives had shown him.

“Don’t step there, nerf-for-brains!” But it was too late for the trooper, too late for the other troopers, and nearly too late for him. He grabbed Boil by the arm, and dived further into the cave.

The proximity bomb went off, the noise of the explosion quickly drowned out by the rocks crashing down from the ceiling, setting off the rest of the bombs. He didn’t stop running, Boil on his heels, until the explosions stopped, and the ceiling stopped trying to crush him.

He turned to study the rocks sealing them in, holding a stitch in his side. Boil collapsed to his knees, gasping for breath. “You’re one lucky son of a bitch, brother.”

“If we get out of here alive, I might almost believe that.” Fives started to laugh, but cut off in a coughing fit. It didn’t look good from this perspective. They’d run at least a good half kilometer into the right fork of the cave, and the boulders were stacked floor to ceiling only a few meters back. It would take a bulldozer. He checked his communicator for transmission — no dice. “Only the one way out. Think all of the bombs went off?”

“After that avalanche? If they didn’t, they’re duds.” Boil groaned as he pushed himself to his feet. He rolled his shoulder and winced. Dislocated, probably. Too much movement for broken. “And so are we, if those bounty hunters are dead.”

“Let’s hope they’re not then.” Fives turned to face the intact part of the cave, readying his blaster. He’d been trained too well to drop it for something as routine as a cave in. Granted, cave-ins had been much more routine when there were Jedi nearby to first cause the cave-in, and then get them out.

“And then we’ll what? Dig ourselves out?” Boil sounded defeated, even as he dropped into a ready stance, favoring his injured shoulder. A good soldier who’d followed orders, and was on his last legs.

“We’ll certainly try.” One damn rock at a time if they had to. He would have expected a rescue on this one, though, if only because Moff what’s-her-name wanted her data back. “Why? Think your troopers won’t dig us out?”

Boil hesitated, then shook his head. “Only because they’re afraid of the consequences if the mission fails.”

“Well, we’ll just have to make sure we don’t fail then.” He tried to sound like the cocksure ARC trooper he’d once been and failed miserably. Not because he thought he’d die — he’d survived worse with less hope — but because he almost didn’t want to, when it meant going back to the same lie he’d been living for the past four years.

They picked their way down the dark tunnel, using only a single dim flashlight to light their way. It was slow going, climbing over smaller rock piles and avoiding tripping over their own feet like the trooper who was now bloody bits scattered among the rocks.

Or tripping over the body of a blue-toned female Twi’lek, who, from the looks of it, had been brained by a sharp rock. The other bounty hunter found them. There was a blinding flare of light, and while they were still blinking, Fives was knocked to the ground. A grunt from Boil and a feminine shriek of rage followed.

Five’s first thought was that the reports had been wrong, and there was more than one of them. But all he could feel on his chest was a heavy, inanimate cloth bag. He blinked the fireworks from his eyes, and pushed himself to his knees.

Boil was grappling with another Twi’lek, obviously still blinded, but managing to keep her clawed hands away from his face. “Help would be nice!” He called.

Fives located his blaster, sent spinning by the impact. The moment he brought it up, he sent off a stun shot. It hit her in the dead center of the chest, blasting her back into opposite wall. She fell face-first to the ground in a rain of pebbles.

Crossing over to her prone body, checked for a pulse. If he died today, it would be from oxygen running out, not bounty hunter. But he injected a sedative into her arm to be safe.

She looked similar enough to the first Twi’lek to be related. It was _not_ these sisters’ day.

He hauled her over his shoulder and stood with a groan. Boil finished rubbing his hands over his eyes, and crawled to the discarded bag to rummage through it. “Her kit and some ration bars, looks like. Better bring it with anyways.”

They returned to the original rockslide, and Fives set the girl on the floor before collapsing against the wall. Boil threw himself down to recline fully on the ground. “We’ll be waiting here a while. Am I going to get to hear some of those famous Grandpa Fives stories?”

Fives snorted. “What’d be the use? You were there for more than half of ‘em. And don’t call me grandpa.”

He left unsaid that the other half were best left unspoken. Missions where Skywalker was without Kenobi hadn’t always gone so well. No surprise that when things went bad permanently, those two had been apart. There wasn’t a Skywalker anymore, without Kenobi.

“I’ll try my hand at it then.” Boil said.

He wouldn’t mind being on the listening end of a story for once. Crossing his arms, Fives let his head rest back on the wall. “Let’s hear it.”

“Waxer tried to adopt this little girl on Ryloth once. Numa. I thought he was crazy at first, but she grew on me. Saved our sorry asses, even.” Boil began, something more than fond reminiscence in his voice. “Got cornered by some gutkurrs, and she got us out through a secret tunnel of all things.”

“The galaxy’s full of secret tunnels, you know that.” Fives joked, when he paused.

“They do come up more often than basic training would have you think.” Boil said wryly. “Could do with one now. Anyway, we got her back to her uncle, and she called us brothers. Like we were her brothers, after how we helped each other. I wonder how she’s grown up. Would she think the same of me? I don’t.”

Fives didn’t speak. He still knew when one of his brothers had more to say.

Finally, Boil sighed. “I guess what I’ve saying is that I want out.”

“That’s what we’re waiting on here.” He gestured at the wall of boulders, as though Boil might have forgotten them.

“Out of the Imperial Army.” Boil clarified.

Ah.

So did he. So much he didn’t let himself think about it, save on rare occasions in the relative privacy of his own bunk. But what could he even do if he deserted? Become a bounty hunter? That wouldn’t up his life expectancy by much. “This seems like as good an opportunity as any, if they ever unbury us.”

“You’d cover for me?” Boil asked, incredulous.

And it would have been an unthinkable ask once. What kind of clone would desert his brothers, the people and ideals of the Republic he wouldn’t exist except to defend? But his brothers in arms were no longer his brothers, and serving the Empire was by nature a betrayal of the Republic. A betrayal of the Jedi they’d loved, and then killed.

“Don’t get many opportunities to do good these days.” He said. “But why now?”

“I’m the last clone from the 212th, that I know of. Hard to tell after we were mixed in with other units. But, well - its been years since I ran into one of us at 79s.” Boil swallowed heavily. “Cody’s gone. I’ve waited so long because I was looking for him. He’d have been the least likely to run off, so —”

Fives wished he could say that surprised him. The 501st only had a few brothers who had been shinies when the Republic fell left. He’d probably have been disposed of himself, if he hadn’t shown an unusual resistance to the Vader effect. “He could have gone after General Kenobi.”

“Yeah, I suppose he could’ve.” Boil said. Neither of them believed it. “I didn’t think I’d ever be the sort, myself.”

He sighed. “Neither did I.”

“You could come with me.” Came the offer.

“No. I couldn’t.” Not yet, not until he had secured as many brothers as he could a way out. Including Boil. “Do you have somewhere to go?”

“I’m not sure. But I know where I’d like to start.” He sounded wistful. What he said next was drowned out by the sound of shifting rocks. Their rescue.

Time to set Boil’s escape into motion then. “After the tunnel’s clear, wait a day or so before you head back to town.”

As he was almost out of sight, Boil paused, and looked back over his shoulder. “Don’t wait too long to get out.”

Getting out from under the thumb of the General would be — well, Fives was fairly certain the General himself no longer cared who was in his command. But he didn’t take betrayal lightly. “I won’t.”

When the boulders were moved to the side, the rescue crew found only Fives and the results of his mission.

“Where are the men who came with you, Captain?” the officer asked.

Fives shook his head under his salute. “I’m the only survivor, sir, excluding our thief here. The others didn’t make it out of the cave in.”

_5 AFE - [Redacted], out of stories to tell_

How many desert planets did one galaxy need? The name of this one hadn’t even been in his briefing. That the General had tracked down his first Jedi Master in over a year was.

He’d witnessed more than one rage over the General’s failure to track down General Kenobi over the years, growing worse as time stretched on. His chambers both in the creepy castle on Mustafar and Coruscant had needed renovations innumerable times over the years. Furniture smashed through windows, soldiers strangled for making the slightest move, speeders crashed into the Senate building enough times they’d had additional shields installed. Jigsaw pieces that had once been people requiring disposal.

The report didn’t sound like Kenobi — non-human, probably a Zabrak, was the conclusion — but the General jumped at any Jedi sighting, convinced it was Kenobi. Furious when it wasn’t.

He braced himself pre-emptively for the fit to come.

While the vast majority of suspected Jedi were still false alarms, those claims had faded in frequency as the Clone Wars receded into memory. The official line now was that the Jedi had faked their powers and conned the Republic for centuries, manipulating its every decision from behind the scenes. Soon enough, they might fade to the status of myth.

It mystified Fives how quickly people could forget.

In this case, the evidence pointed to a Jedi. The holo of a hooded man levitating a fallen slab of duracrete off an injured construction worker had been checked thoroughly for forgery.

He’d watched the General and his Inquisitors kill Jedi and former Padawans more than once over the years. He could stand it one last time, before he took his chance, before the timer counting down the end of his usefulness ran out.

He had not expected the kid.

Fives was along as the getaway driver. He wasn’t the most qualified pilot, but his years of service had made him the most qualified secret-keeper. The General would have flown himself, if he didn’t hate the Inquisitors enough to refuse to take his eyes off them.

As though the mission hadn’t been uncomfortable enough, alone on board the transport with the General and three sneering Inquisitors. Feeling the General’s desire to strangle the lot of them, even without the ability to sense the Force. The General took the female Inquisitor with him, leaving the other two in the back of the transport. One immediately pulled out a sabacc deck, and they set to bickering over it.

At first, Fives only kept an ear out for orders. If he pretended to be bored instead of horrified, he could sometimes get away without an eyeful of guts that had once belonged to a vaguely familiar face. He was still forced to listen through the comm.

“Eeth Koth.” The General hissed in his Vader-voice, using the voice modulator he’d shown up with one day without explanation. Like the helmet he never took off, it served no purpose Fives could see, save to make him more frightening, less human. Skywalker’s voice could be whining under there, like he used to whenever Master Kenobi agreed with the Jedi Council over him, and he would only sound bored. “Disgraced Jedi Master.”

Fives hadn’t known Master Koth. He’d been an image on the holotable at most. Never made much of an impression, unlike some of the Council Members with more personality, like Fisto or Windu. He didn’t deserve to die, but Fives wouldn’t loose as much sleep over him as some of the others.

“Anakin Skywalker. I wondered if you might show up. Unfortunately, you are too late. I am no longer a Jedi.” The flare of a lit saber came through the comm anyway.

“Anakin Skywalker is dead.” The General said, like he did anytime someone brought up his name. Though his identity was still a matter of public record, he was touchy about it, . It seemed to Fives that denying it only gave his opponents a spot to poke at, before they died.

The hisses and crackles of a lightsaber battle came through as feedback. The General didn’t banter so much anymore, if his opponent were not so inclined. So he had no clue how the duel was going, other than that the General would ultimately win. Fives continued to stare out the window at the wall of Master Koth’s house to the tune of his oncoming migraine.

“There’s no way you didn’t bomb out with that hit! Show me your sleeves.” The Twi’lek Inquisitor shouted.

“Don’t be so boring. Either pay up, or play another round.” Fifth Brother, a gray humanoid he’d had the misfortune of meeting a few times before, drawled. A furious growl was his response. Sounded like the Inquisitor’s sabacc game was turning violent. Maybe they’d murder each other, and improve his day.

There was a loud crashing sound, and a hole appeared in the wall of the house, small figures fleeing through it.

“Damned med-droid.” The female Inquisitor swore as she chased after the figures, quickly catching up.

“Follow her, captain.” The orders came through the comm. Fives numbly hit the requisite switches and flew after them.

The Inquisitor on the ground was standing over a Zabrak woman crumpled on the ground, but still alive, clutching a bundle to her chest. An older man’s body was slumped nearby. Over the comm, he could hear the woman begging, attempting to appeal to the Inquisitor’s shared womanhood. Not a good bet.

“We have no need of _you_ , only the Jedi’s child.” The Inquisitor sneered.

Ah, kriff. The bundle was a baby?

_Master Koth’s_ baby? He knew the Jedi hadn’t been uniformly celibate — he’d served under General Skywalker, for fuck’s sake — but they didn’t have _children_. What could have possessed a Jedi in hiding to bring a child into the galaxy?

Fives set the transport to hovering, and walked to the back space of the transport, unsure what he expected to do once he got there. Even as a former ARC trooper, he was only one clone. The Inquisitors, predictably, ignored him entirely, continuing to argue over sabacc card counts.

The female Inquisitor suddenly vaulted upwards onto the platform, leaving mother and baby behind.

“Vader won’t be pleased.” Fifth Brother said blandly as he splayed his hand of cards face-up on the table, rising smoothly to his feet.

“He’s going to kill you.” The Twi’lek said gleefully, and also factually. He reached across the table while Fifth Brother wasn’t looking, and plucked a pair of tokens, setting them back in his own, much diminished pile.

“Will he?” With a wave of her hand, the third Inquisitor tore the baby from its mother and summoned it into her arms. It wailed piteously, frightened by flight and unfamiliar touch. Five curled his hands into his fists, barely resisting the urge to reach for his blaster.

Inquisitors didn’t become inquisitors if she still understood mercy.

“Trooper. Give me your blaster.” She jerked it out of his grasp using the Force and aimed a careless shot towards the ground. With the Force, no shot was ever truly careless.

The mother jerked and toppled onto the prone form of the man like a puppet with clipped strings, clutching the hole in her chest.

The splatter of blood against his visor —

A youngling falling to the ground —

The mechanical execution of an order, pulling a trigger –

Shaking off the memories of the day his choice was stolen, Fives made his decision.

Fives drew his blaster and pulled the trigger in one smooth movement.

There was only so much he could do against three Inquisitors. But Fives had the element of surprise, and the blood staining his hands proved Jedi were not invincible. Even corrupted Jedi like these.

The blaster hole appeared in the Inquisitor’s forehead, splattering her brains onto the metal behind her, but it seemed like forever before she toppled backwards to the floor, the baby still clutched in her arms.

It shouldn’t have been enough. It should have been a futile last stand. Though Fives did not want to die, there had always been a good chance he’d go out in a blaze (or, more likely whimper) of glory, and it would have been a better death than waiting for them to come for him. But he had underestimated how much the Inquisitors despised each other, and how inestimably stupid that made them.

“Tired of her too, eh?” Fifth Brother looked down at the body of his compatriot and reached out a hand, as though to clap Fives on the shoulder.

Fives grabbed him by the shoulder and tossed him out of the transport, shooting the third, the Twi’lek, in the neck as he scrambled for his lightsaber, a surprised horror on his face. Without missing a beat, he slammed the transport doors shut and locked them, one after the other.

Though the baby needed attention — sobbing its little lungs out over the loss of its mother, whatever it could feel in the force, or the fact it was laying in a cooling, dead woman’s arms — it was more important to get away while there was a slight window of opportunity. Fives removed his comm from his ear, cutting off the sound of the ongoing duel, and crushed it under his heel. Returning to the pilot seat, he resumed control of the transport, and made a beeline for the hunk of rock’s only major city.

His reckless flying would have done the old General Skywalker proud.

The General would follow at a breakneck pace the moment he located anything that could be driven. Something of a challenge, in the middle of nowhere. Fives had no doubt it was one the General was capable of surmounting, since he was still in possession of Skywalker’s brain. But it would take even the General some time, and might give Fives just enough of a head start.

The public transport center was, thankfully, on the edge of town, so Fives was able to land only a few hundred meters away from the entrance. There was no point in trying to hide it. There was no other way to get off this mudhole without his own hyperdrive-capable ship. It would only be harder on him to try to hide a transport the General could track with the click of a button.

The infant was still shrieking when he finally went to pick it up, peeling the Inquistor’s stiffening fingers back from the bundle. His headache was nearing the level of blurred vision. Clones weren’t supposed to get migraines, but Fives was certain he’d outlived his intended purpose. There were aches in his back, protests in his joints, when he vaulted across training courses that had once been easy, or even just from sleep. He’d reached his Imperially appointed expiration date. If he went out now, at least he went out trying to do something good, something the Kaminoans that monitored ever step of his incubation in that tank would never have expected.

In his arms, the baby calmed to soft, sniffling sobs, staring up at him with big, watery eyes. Fives understood for the first time why people thought babies were cute. Even if this one was about to get him killed.

He peeled off his armor before leaving. A black jumpsuit was far less memorable than a runaway stormtrooper.

The ticket seller was another Zabrak, tan and bored looking, with a chipped horn prominent on his forehead. Fives cleared his throat. “What are the next transports leaving the planet?”

“Coruscant, in fifteen minutes. Bespin, in twenty-five.” The Zabrak said, in the best example of the Bored Service Worker Voice that Fives had ever heard.

Bespin was the obvious choice, Coruscant a death trap. But the General would notice that too. If Fives got on the transport to Bespin, there would be a star destroyer waiting for him. He’d never so much as set foot in Cloud City. What the General might not do was ask further questions. He made mistakes when it seemed like there was an obvious solution.

“The Coruscant one have a refueling stop on the way?” He asked casually, shifting the now sniffling baby, hoping that was all the ticket seller would remember.

“Some little hole in the wall station, yeah.”

“I’ll take the Coruscant one then.” If he switched to a private transport at the station, laid low and circled back to the one place the General had already checked — well.

All those years of a front row seat to the General’s decisions might just pay off in not dying today.

“That’ll be fifty credits.”

He’d known hiding the occasional credit from his leave allowance would pay off. If things off Coruscant were _that_ cheap, his credits might last long enough to disappear. Fives made a show of grumbling as he handed them over. Less noticeable that way.

The Zabrak never looked directly at him.

He was the last passenger on board before the ramp was sealed. Bouncing the baby like he’d seen parents do, albeit with much less success, he claimed a window seat. As the transport rose into the atmosphere, he saw a blur of dust approaching the town. The General would arrive just after the Bespin transport departed. By the time he realized Fives wasn’t on he should be in the wind.

The baby wailed it’s little lungs out, earning glares from the other passengers. Fives stared down at it helplessly.

It had been five years, almost to the day, since his world ended. Now he was free. How bloody symbolic. But what the hell was he supposed to do with an infant?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last scene based on the Eeth Koth arc of the 2018 Vader comic, but I did not dig my digital copy out of wherever it ended up in my computer to reread it before writing
> 
> Next time: I use my credentials as a bioengineer to make up science so the clones can have nice things and throw in an f/f pairing for good measure. No one tell my advisor


	6. Kix's Ten Step Program for Beating Brainwashing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kix juggles med school, research, and matchmaking. Kaeden just wants an ordinary life, but with her taste in friends (and women) that's not in the cards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter brought to you by the bioeng PhD experience. (Please don’t ask me how educational systems work in Star Wars though, this is a galaxy where they let 14 year olds run a planet.)
> 
> I came up with some ideas for this chapter while reading Seanan McGuire’s Incryptid series and would like to apologize in advance for any and all unwanted knowledge of bug biology
> 
> Takes place 4-8 AFE

_Step 1. Leave behind everything you know_

Kaeden was getting really tired of having the same old argument. “At least go to university first.”

Miara didn’t brood like an ordinary teenager. Oh, she was flat on her back on the sofa, her feet propped up on the use-dented arm. But ordinary teenagers didn’t brood by tinkering with bombs. Without the explosives inside —she hoped — but still bombs. “Why? So I can get a degree saying I can do things I learned years ago? No thanks.”

What did she need for the day? Datapad and stylus for notes, lab coat — autopsy lab today — looking presentable. Right. She glanced in the mirror. Her braids were still ok - good. She didn’t have time to redo them. Just oil and makeup then.

“I’m going to flight school, and then I’m leaving.” Miara announced.

Kaeden jabbed herself in the eye with her mascara wand.

It was not a promising start to the day.

She was only half paying attention when she walked into the lecture hall of her first class, side-stepping one person only to bump into another, a man with one of the elaborate braided updos and flowing white clothes of the locals. “Sorry.” She muttered, and collapsed into the nearest seat.

Her datapad did not do her the favor of staying in place on the tiny armrest desk, and slid over onto her neighbor’s lap.

“I think this is yours.” He handed it back to her, his voice sounding oddly familiar.

“Thank…s.” Kaeden did a double take. What was Rex doing in her Physiology of Species with Decentralized Circulatory Systems class? The tattoos amidst the lightning pattern in his decidedly black buzz cut registered a beat later. She could have smacked herself. Of course.

Correction: What was this not-Rex clone doing in her Physiology of Species with Decentralized Circulatory Systems class?

Alderaan was the first place Kix had ever been where he wasn’t immediately recognized as a clone. It probably helped that he was dressed like any ordinary planet-bound denizen, without any visible weaponry. And didn’t that feel strange.

(Though he wasn’t completely weaponless; he’d probably crawl out of his skin within minutes of stepping out of his front door.)

He would never get used to the way the loose, eye-catching Alderaanian fashions flowed, not quite hindering movement, but not helping it either. And certainly providing no protection. It had also been centuries since Alderaan had seen war, and he already looked older than the old holos.

He could have been anyone.

What he was, officially, was a medical student. If someone examined the paperwork, they’d find a medical student the Queen’s consort had inexplicably handed his own fully funded laboratory. But consorts were allowed their quirks.

And he’d come to Alderaan for more than one reason.

He’d been trained as a medic for the people he came into contact with on a regular basis back in Torrent Company. So: clones, General Skywalker, more clones, Commander Tano, General Kenobi (with a disturbing frequency, considering he had his own damn medic), and yet more clones. He’d been lucky to get more training than most clone medics, only because of just how often Skywalker got himself electrocuted, or concussed, or stabbed - the list went on. That didn’t give him the knowledge he needed to treat anyone who wasn’t human or Togruta.

He’d been lucky, at first. Had even managed to learn enough to deliver General Naberrie’s twins, which had not been in his training. But then in came an injured Rodian, and Kix had started to treat what looked like the more serious wound, when the man bled out from the smaller wound that nicked his heart. If Kix had known his physiology, known he was cold-blooded, he would have lived.

When he’d brought up his failure, he’d found himself shipped off to Alderaan in no time at all. The opportunity to learn to be the surgeon the Rebellion needed — and a lab full of the resources he needed to find a way to help his brothers. Bail Organa, it seemed, had some unresolved guilt over his complicity in the war.

He hadn’t had a chance to object. And frankly, he didn’t want to.

“Is there something on my face?” Kix asked the girl whose datapad he’d returned, whose eyes had widened with recognition as they reached his face. Kriff, had she recognized him as a clone? Already?

She was dressed like an Alderaanian, but even most non-human off-worlders took up that habit within their first week at University of Aldera. And he’d bet she hadn’t gotten that sturdy build from managing droids at a Toniray vineyard. If the war had touched her home planet, she would have recognized him on sight.

“No, nothing.” She said, turning to face the lectern as the professor began the class.

Dr. Presaantian was a leading expert in sentient arthropod physiology and had pioneered a groundbreaking surgery for simultaneous quadruple channel bypass in arachnids before joining the University faculty. He also made a sport of calling on the least prepared looking student. Kix hated his guts.

“The Kobok’s hemolymph is pumped forward by their central aorta and feeds into the head. The hemolymph is then carried through the exoskeleton to the rear on the same current generated by the aorta. What considerations would you take in treating a Kobok with decreased aortic pumping for a ruptured air sac?” The professor searched his audience for a victim. “Ah, you look like you were up late studying.” He pointed out his neighbor.

She startled, blinking from a doze into alertness. “The patient would need to be hooked up to an arthropod pacemaeker during surgery.”

“True, true.” Dr. Presaantian nodded, and Kix just knew he was going to nitpick. “Would you typically expect to see those symptoms together?”

“Uh....” She said.

As it happened, Kix had nothing to do anymore _but_ study. He jumped in, “It would be unusual. Could be a sign of neural deterioration and the hemolymph should be tested to make sure there will be no post-surgical complications.”

The girl filled the gap. “If the test comes back positive, I would prescribe Neuroantifen CXD.”

He couldn’t hope she wouldn’t rat him out for only a minor save in class, even if Dr. Presaantian was the Notorious GPA Dropper.

“Good, good. Mr. Kitiran--” his awful, but easy to remember alias -- “Ms. Larte.” Dr. Presaantian nodded, blinking his bulbous eyes in that distractible, evil academic way of his. Kix had never thought he’d miss the bounty hunters that kicked his ass daily growing up, but they had nothing on professors. All but one or two seemed to have graduated and immediately decided to inflict their own pain on future generations of doctors. “Now, who can explain how the partially decentralized system of Toydarians enables flight despite their body mass?”

Larte kept glancing at him through class.

It was probably nothing. And if he kept jumping to conclusions every time someone looked at him twice, he’d be outed as a clone for real.

Discharged clones went on to work in security, or manual labor. Maybe took up farming, if they were lucky. They did not go to med school. He couldn’t afford questions.

Just in case, he began gathering his things to make a break for it in the minutes before class ended.

The moment they were dismissed, Kix used the back of the seat in front of him to leap into the empty space the next row down, making a beeline for the door.

“Wait!” The girl called out, running after him.

It would be too suspicious if he ran away from some random student. Passers by might assume she was his ex – not knowing he was as gay as they came – but she would notice. And unless he planned to give up his research, picking up and leaving wasn’t an option. Kix was the only living expert on clone physiology outside the Empire’s control. And he had no intention to let his brothers be used again.

He stopped and turned, waiting for her to catch up

“I wanted to say thank you.”

“Well, now you’ve said it.” His short tone was a clear dismissal.

Larte didn’t take it that way, blurting out, “How did a clone end up at an Alderaanian med school?” She clapped her mands over her mouth. “Sorry, that was rude.”

He froze. “You’re mistaken.”

“No, no I’m not.” She shook her head. “A clone helped save my life.”

“Ah, during the war?” The clones left in the Empire weren’t exactly in the business of saving people. Through no fault of their own, but that didn’t change the outcome.

“No, after. Neither the Separatists nor the Republic had much use for my backwater moon.” She scoffed. “The Empire saw things differently.”

Kix relaxed slightly. Even on Alderaan, openly dismissing the Empire was risky. It was unlikely Larte had plans to expose him, if she’d given him that kind of ammunition. “Yeah, well. The Empire tends to do that.”

“You’re not part of it anymore.”

Obviously. “You think the Empire would send a clone medic to become a surgeon?”

She shook her head, a slight smirk playing over her lips. “I think Bail Organa would.”

“You’ve got me.” He sighed. At least she seemed anti-Empire. Kix didn’t really want to explain to Senator Organa how he’d already ruined things. “Now, what do you plan to do about it?”

Larte shook her head again, frustrated, like he wasn’t getting something she found obvious. “The clone who saved me? His name is Rex.”

_Step 2. Make a new friend_

Kaeden took a sip from her sparkly galaxy fruit juice, thinking once again about how much her life had changed in only a few years.

Here she was, quizzing a clone as they studied for their midterms. On a sunny day in the Alderaanian Royal Palace’s gardens. Across the courtyard, Senator Organa was having a meeting with the most striking woman she’d ever seen.

(Excluding the Jedi who had saved her life, of course. _She_ was welcome to bend her over on the nearest flat surface any day. Sadly, it could never be.)

A Pantoran, the woman wore delicately painted gold patterns crisscrossing her face, obscuring her natural markings.

Bail freaking Organa was meeting with a suave, gorgeous spy right next to her, and Kaeden was expected to just keep studying. Why was her life like this?

“How many chambers does a Zabrak’s heart have?” She read from the next flashcard that popped up on her data pad.

Kix was quick to answer. “Five. The two atriums and ventricles, and the central nodule that pumps lymph.”

The gardens of the Royal Palace had quickly become Kaeden’s favorite place to study. Not only were they beautiful with excellent droid service for whatever food and drink she could think to request, they weren’t overrun by the hordes of students that took over every corner of the library. And the droids didn’t snap at her every time she dared to make a sound.

Clean air, a vast assortment of colorful flowers, and trees laden with every fruit imaginable were a much more pleasant environment for cramming medical facts into her brain. Kaeden could almost forget her sister’s ongoing rebellion, in her insistence on joining the Rebellion.

“How does the Geonosian circulatory system work?” Kix asked next.

Kaeden rattled off the answer. “A central aorta with five branching arteries pumps hemolymph through the exoskeleton.”

Princess Evaan ran by like an excited tooka, her long-suffering nurse-droid trailing after, making increasingly distressed pleas for the girl to slow down, act like a princess, and stop ruining her hair.

They kept on with the flashcards for a while, but eventually, Kaeden’s curiosity got the best of her. “Please explain how a spy can casually meet with an Alderaanian Senator in public?”

“Anyone can walk into these gardens and meet the Queen’s consort.” Kix said. “That’s what makes Alderaan unique. The rulers actually listen to the people.”

The gorgeous spy handed something over.

The great Bail Organa noticed them watching. He held a finger to his lips and winked, badly.

The Pantoran woman he’d been conspiring with spotted them, and to Kaeden’s shock and panic, walked over.

“I didn’t think I’d run into you here, Kix.” She said. “I thought you had your hands full.”

“Turns out the biology of us clones isn’t universal.” He held up his textbook, _Vasculature Systems of the Galaxy_. “I’m going from medic to licensed surgeon, on Senator Organa’s dime.”

“Good for you.” She said, and then, horribly, turned to Kaeden. The strangeness of her makeup should have done _something_ to dull the effects of her looks up close but did not. Worse was her smile, the pale yellow of her laughing eyes. “And you’re…?”

“Single.” She blurted out, and immediately regretted it. All the blood rushed to her face. “I mean… I’m. I’m Kaeden Larte.”

She wasn’t attracted to men often and never with more than casual interest. But on that rare occasion, she didn’t get tongue tied. Only beautiful women had that effect. It was a curse. She _still_ couldn’t speak to her dissection lab TA while looking her in the eye.

This was why she never got dates. That, and her tendency to be attracted to women for whom danger was a drug, like her ex from undergrad who jumped off cliffs for fun, despite Kaeden’s own preference for a quiet, stable life.

Not that some galaxy trotting spy would ever be interested in _her_ , a farmer turned med student with perpetual eye bags.

“Good to know.” The spy looked her up and down. “Where did you get your scarf? I love it.”

It being exam season, Kaeden hadn’t had time to redo her braids for… a week? More? She might as well chop it all off and start over from scratch at that point. Hence: scarf. A nice, easy way to hide how much of a disaster she was. If only it was that easy to hide her lack of _sleep_. “Thanks. I made it, actually.”

You didn’t live on a resource-poor moon in the middle of nowhere without learning to make or at least repair your own clothes. Miara had been delighted that easily available, mass produced clothing meant she would never have to touch a sewing machine again. But for Kaeden, it had become a form of stress relief.

“I bet your stitches are perfect in the operating theatre.” She said, which could have been a strange way of flirting. “Maybe you should take up that hobby. Make my stitches prettier next time.”

“Riyo, if you want pretty stitches, get a body mod, not stabbed in the neck. No one complained about scars in the war.” Kix grumbled, sounding wistful. Kaeden would never understand how he could sound wistful about war.

“Soldiers think scars are badges of honor. Security systems use them as identifiers.” The woman, Riyo, replied. It sounded like an old argument turned joke. “Do you know how long it takes to cover my entire neck with makeup? I can’t wear a turtleneck to the beach, everyone knows Pantorans aren’t that modest.”

Her taste in women continued to be terrible and prone to treating stabbings as an everyday thing. Good thing this one wasn’t sticking around.

“Yeah, yeah. Hand over the kids’ latest masterpieces.” He held out his hand, palm up, and curled his fingers in expectantly.

Kaeden had been told very little about the base in question, beyond the fact that it existed, Kix planned to return after he finished his time on Alderaan, and that Miara was unlikely to be sent there after finishing flight training. She preferred it that way.

She had, however, picked up that there were kids, who could be Jedi, and Kix was fond of them.

Riyo handed over a datastick that Kix eagerly plugged into his datapad. A grin broke over his face. “Is that Rex’s beard as the sun? I love it. That girl is getting so talented.”

“Now that that’s delivered, I have to run. See you in a few months.” Riyo turned back to smile and wave as she walked away. Kaeden knocked over her juice. Kix was going to make so much fun of her for that.

_Step 3. Dissect way too many dead bodies_

The unbearable truth of the matter was that Kix would have to autopsy his own brothers to learn how to save the ones who remained. Though he had known that from the beginning, the reality only set in when he walked into the lab Senator Organa had set aside for him to find his brothers' bodies waiting on ice.

Even if the inhibitor chips had no health affects, which seemed unlikely, there was still the matter of their triggering again, or breaking down. And could a similar chip be implanted into natural born denizens of the galaxy? Without a ready off switch, that would be the end of resistance.

The Kaminoans had weeded out deleterious early life mutations — they were, essentially, crops in the Kaminoan geneticists’ minds — but what did the accelerated aging rate mean for their susceptibility in later life? At how much higher a rate would their genetic code induce mutations, simply because their cells divided more quickly?

He’d expected to have to do the work entirely on his own, despite his lack of relevant expertise in types of science that involved anything other than putting people back together. Despite the nausea that set in the moment he set a knife to a man with his face. But Kaeden volunteered to help the moment she found out about the chips, even before he admitted the problems linked to accelerated aging.

“Your entire life is a war crime,” She’d whispered under her breath when she thought he couldn’t hear.

Legally, it hadn’t been. Or, at least, not after the First Battle of Geonosis, when the Senate granted the then-Chancellor extraordinary powers and made sweeping changes to the War Etiquette Protocols.

Kix hated the feeling of treating his brothers’ corpses like science experiments, despite having no problems with dissecting other bodies in labs. It helped, if she made the initial dissections, so he was handling faceless organs and not family. She had also, used the high-tech microscopes and analytic devices his lab had been supplied with before, which were far beyond the level of testing equipment he’d had in the GAR.

As he labored over sectioning a frozen brain onto slides, Kaeden sat at a microscope, imaging a stained section of one of his brothers’ brains. “The way I see it we have two questions to answer: how do we turn off those chips, and how do we get you a normal lifespan.”

Kix found her optimism refreshing, but he wasn’t getting his hopes up. “The aging chips are too intertwined with our physiology to safely remove.” Directly built into the brainstem, where it interfaced directly with the pituitary gland. From that position, it could control and fundamentally alter a clone’s hormone production to speed up aging.

“You have a point, but I’m not giving up hope.” Kaeden twitched the microscope’s joystick, moving the sample into a new position. She spun the lens back and forth, bringing the cells into clarity “On Raada, the average lifespan was fifty-nine, even before the Empire. Here it’s _one hundred and seven._ The Queen has an artificial heart and lungs that glow in her chest. Anything’s possible.”

“Be that as it may, those things took decades if not centuries to develop. We’ve got thirty years, at most.” Kix would rather live the rest of his life well, prepared and ready to deal with any complications related to his biology, than set his hopes on a long shot. He preferred concrete goals with achievable solutions. “The mind control chips can be removed, given that I’m still running around and not brain dead, but I won’t be able to convince every one of my brothers I come across to undergo brain surgery.”

“Brain surgery is never ideal.” Kaeden agreed over the clicking sound of the camera capturing the imaging region.

A tissue section cracked as he peeled it away from the surface. Kix cursed, and tested the sharpness of the blade. Deteriorated enough to need replacing. “And certainly not on the fly.”

He sliced open the tip of the forefinger of his gloves while extracting the replacement blade from its box, cursed again, and exchanged _that_ for a new one before finishing the job.

“So remind me again what we know.” Kaeden liked to brainstorm.

It was kind of familiar - listing facts and debating what they meant for their work, hoping it would spark a breakthrough. Discussions like that were common on the bridge of the _Resolute_ , with General Skywalker and Commander Tano disagreeing as much as they agreed, but always unconventional. Rex chiming in occasionally, sometimes a voice of reason, other times only adding to the madness. Yularen, whose protests were near uniformly ignored, visiting the med bay for his blood pressure in the aftermath.

Kix wasn’t used to participating.

He understood now why his commanding officers — minus Yularen, who’d stayed with the Empire voluntarily, but had not been replaced by a pod person like General Skywalker, and therefore didn’t count — had found it so useful.

The best ideas often came from impulsive retorts.

The blade slipped again as he tried to fit it into the narrow slot. Kix was a capable, highly trained clone officer, and he was perfectly capable of detaching a blade as he spoke without slicing off a finger. “One: The chips were activated by a voice command - so they’re sound responsive. Two: the command was Order 66, which implies the existence of other orders — so responsive to multiple sounds.” _Finally,_ the blade eased into place as though it had never caused him so much frustration in the first place. “Which means sound might work as a back door.”

He sliced a ten-millimeter thick section off his sample too aggressively, losing it into the depths of the cryo-sectioner. “The problem is finding what turns it off without activating anything else by mistake.”

“Well this biochip is a bunch of dead cells.” Kaeden clicked on a link for the microscopy software to count the number of cells in her sample. “We can’t test it’s frequency response, because these cells aren’t signaling anymore.”

“It’s functionally a section of our brains - albeit designed to be harmful.” He pointed out, brushing the lost tissue into the disposal area. “So it should be possible to read the genes and reconstruct the chips artificially. But I don’t know how to do that. Because I am a medic, not a scientist.”

“Lucky for you I studied biology in undergrad.” A very useful fact that Kaeden made a point to remind him of frequently. “We shouldn’t forget the organelles, and the proteins, or any free nucleic acids or cytokines. I think we can manage the extraction and data collection. But the actual reconstruction…that’s engineering. Think Senator Organa will buy us some expensive software to do it for us?”

“Yeah, sure. I have a very close relationship with his money.” Bail Organa’s approach to money was essentially: _is it for a good cause? Ok, here’s a billion credits, have fun._ “Especially Royal Science Fund AU57297. We’re having a spring wedding.”

“You’re such a weirdo.” She rolled her eyes, but chocked on a laugh. “But that’s good in this case because I found this one biomolecular modeling software that can deal with all the raw data for us, and even has a user friendly interface for putting the model together, running the virtual tests, and then generating a pattern that precisely replicates the model for bioprinting.” That sounded like exactly what they needed. “But only a few research hospitals in the core have it, because it costs as much as a small planet covered in chromium mines.”

Kix didn’t foresee that becoming a problem. “He’ll just pass it off as a gift to the university. The Queen’s birthday is coming up, and he usually gives a big educational grant on her behalf.”

“This planet is as incomprehensible as my sister.” As someone whose financial literacy consisted of figuring out whether she could afford a new microwave and paying her taxes correctly, Kaeden sighed mournfully. “Last night she told me she’d crashed ten times in the simulator this term and tried to pass that off as a good thing.”

He hummed ambivalently. That was actually an excellent score in Alderaan’s intensive flight training program, where pilots were required to be able to virtually navigate randomly programmed asteroid fields in simulator before they ever sat in the pilot’s seat. But Kaeden didn’t want to hear that. “Are you going to clean up the blood you dripped on the floor?”

_Step 4. Find an unexpected solution_

In the end, Kaeden’s optimism was well founded. Not that Kix would ever admit it. The answer came from his experimental medicine class. Not a course he needed to be a trauma surgeon, but novel drugs were often useful in other situations. Like biological warfare. Which he had seen the aftermath of exactly once with the Blue Shadow Virus, and had no desire to ever again.

Besides, Professor Megona was one of the few professors in this place he respected. They had not yet succumbed to the narcissistic virus that was academic success.

He read through the assigned case study. Blinked. Read it again. Checked to make sure the light coming through his window wasn’t making him see things. Read it through five times more.

An urgent sensation he didn’t dare call hope burned in his chest. He leaped to his feet, and raced towards Kaeden’s apartment in Old Town Aldera, forgoing a tram in favor of his own two feet.

He was sweating by the time he knocked on the door of her fifth-floor apartment, breathless in a way that had nothing to do with exertion. The datapad describing a miracle clutched in a death grip against his chest.

It was Kaeden’s little sister who opened the door, eyeing his appearance critically. “Why do you look like you ran a marathon in a business suit?” Miara asked. She was wearing her pilot’s suit, a small suitcase in hand.

He raised a finger, showing how much time he needed before he regained the ability to speak. The light colors of an Alderaanian wardrobe were not meant for exercise. And Kix had been slacking off on staying in shape, with med school and research eating up all his time.

Maybe he should rethink that. Surely he could fit in a little cardio and a few pushups _somewhere_ , or Rex would really put him through the grinder when he finally got back.

“Miara, do you have your emergency kit?” Kaeden entered the entryway carrying a stack of vacuum-linked short-term food storage containers, filled with pre-cooked meals and snacks, by the handle. Noticing Kix standing in the doorway, she gave him an absent-minded wave, preoccupied by her sister.

“Yes, _mom_.” Miara rolled her eyes.

“If you don’t survive flight school, you can’t go off and join the Rebellion.” Kaeden reminder her in a tone that edged into patronizing.

Never a good tactic with anyone. Especially a headstrong young woman who’d bombed an Imperial base at fourteen. “Sounds like what you’d want then.”

Kaeden was stricken. “Don’t _ever_ say that. I just want you safe.”

“No one’s ever really safe.” Miara scoffed, “You think Alderaan’s going to be safe forever? The way the Senator argues against every law the Emperor’s patsies write? With how much Alderaan spends on aid to planets the Empire wants ground underfoot? Please.”

She pushed past Kix and slammed the door behind her.

With a sigh, Kaeden rubbed her hands over her face. It was not the first time Kix had witnessed that argument, and it wouldn’t be the last. Finally, she looked up, and her expression shifted back to concern. “You look half-dead.”

“I ran here.” He said blankly.

Rolling her eyes, she dragged him into the combined kitchen and living room. She took some iced tea from the conservator and poured a glass, pressing it into his hand. “Drink that and sit down before you pass out.”

Kix sat heavily on the couch and obediently took a sip that turned into a gulp.

Kaeden perched on the arm of her armchair and crossed her legs. “I hope you brought something to distract me from the fact that my sister’s going to be playing tag with laser-shooting droids for the next week.”

“Have you ever heard of Thomas Toov?” He hadn’t, before today.

She shook her head.

“He’s a shady art collector. Human. And over 400 years old.” Kix went to take another drink, and found his glass empty. When had that happened?

“That’s…” Kaeden took the glass from him, but did not move to refill it. “That shouldn’t be possible.”

“According to my homework, it’s very possible.” He handed over the datapad, his hand shaking, peeling his fingers back from the edge with great difficulty, as though its contents might disappear forever the moment he let go.

Kaeden read through the document with a furrow between her brows. Kix had already memorized every word.

_Thomas Toov lived for two hundred and fifty years before he was bound to a stasis pod. No other known human has achieved such a feat. The heir to a successful conglomerate, Toov claimed in an early interview that he had everything, except eternal life. He employed thousands of scientists in his private lab, promising a lifetime of funding for whoever helped him conquer death. Eventually, they succeeded in developing a formula that more than quadrupled Toov’s lifespan._

_This could have been the start of a massive healthcare revolution for humankind. However, Toov never published the results. He has since kept the drug under lock and key. The drug was never evaluated under the safety standards of any planet and never put into mass production. The scientists who developed it were bound to the lab for life, and though they were allowed to pursue and publish other work, none lived far past the limits of the human lifespan achievable by current standards. Toov has spent the last three centuries establishing himself as an art collector, selecting only the most rare and unique of masterworks, even providing grants to museums in exchange for pieces that caught his eye._

_Toov’s case would be considered a fluke, were it not for his periodic distribution of doses to a select clientele. These wealthy clients pay an exorbitant price for the privilege of longevity, though none have yet lived as long as Toov. Instead, these customers have taken the drug for either as long as their funds support the cost, or until they required a stasis pod._

_Alleged connections with intergalactic gangs such as Crimson Dawn have made this secrecy and limited supply a possibility. Scientists outside Toov’s own lab have never been able to gain a sample of the drug. The formula remain unknown._

Kix had not yet bothered to read the conversation questions that followed. Assignments could wait. This — this was a lifeline.

“We’re sure this isn’t a series of men pulling off a scam?” Kaeden asked, when she was finished.

“He has been selling it privately.” He pointed out. Otherwise, Kix might be inclined to think the same. Some species lived for hundreds of years, but humans weren’t one of them. There were stories of human kings seeking eternal life going back millennia. Yet this Toov was the one who’d come closest to succeeding.

Kaeden nodded, accepting his argument. “So it either uses ingredients so rare he’s worried they’ll run out, or he’s just that selfish.”

“Toov is a trillionare _and_ he trades with Crimson Dawn. I wouldn’t put it past him.” Kix muttered.

“If he’s so secretive about it, how do you expect to find the formula?” For all her admiration of the Jedi — and Tano specifically — Kaeden had never actually spent much time with one.

Kix, on the other hand, had had plenty of time to learn how to get himself into and out of improbable situations. Things that looked impossible were often just a puzzle waiting to be solved. “Simple. It’s been a while since I pulled a heist.”

_Step 5. Pull a heist_

Kix had been hitting the gym daily since he came up with the plan, sculpting his muscles back into shape and hitting the shooting range with a vengeance. He wanted — needed — to go on the retrieval mission himself. But he didn’t have the requisite skillset for any necessary slicing or thievery. Therefore, he needed to be the muscle.

It might have been easier to learn the new skills, in the end. His body wasn’t what it used to be. It was damn hard, but he managed it, dropping a few lab hours a week to prepare. Kix would have to keep it up, after, or he doubted he’d be able to again.

For the skills he lacked, Kix had a candidate who excelled at blending into unexpected places in mind.

“Aren’t you an elite clone officer? Didn’t they train you for this?” Miara had caught wind of some part of Kix’s mission, somehow, though Kaeden swore she hadn’t let anything slip. She’d dragged Kaeden to the private hanger his ride was picking him up from, despite Kaeden’s stated preference of pretending this wasn’t happening.

Still so enthusiastic about everything, years later. He hoped she managed to keep that quality, when she found out what war was really like.

“I was a medic, not a slicer.” Kix said fondly, patting her on the shoulder. “Even if I was, breaking into a criminal syndicate’s ship isn’t exactly a good idea without backup.”

Not that he didn’t know certain Jedi who’d done exactly that.

Kaeden crossed her arms. Since her sister had dragged here there early in the morning, straight out of bed, she looked remarkably un put together in sweats and a t-shirt patterned with tookas. “I’m still stuck on the part where you think this is a good idea at all.”

“Aw, come on, Larte.” Kix teased her. “Where’d all that optimism go?”

“That optimism was about a solution existing. Not stealing one from armed and dangerous criminals.” She sassed him back. Apparently, it was never too early for sarcasm. “Sanity won out.”

The ceiling canopy opened to admit a small freighter, which swooped in to make an easy landing, in the spot nearest to them.

“There’s the woman I’ll be climbing through vents with! You may recognize her.” Kix leaned in to wink at her.

Kaeden’s mouth twisted and she looked down her nose at him. “What do you —? Oh no.”

The Pantoran woman descending the ramp was not wearing a helmet. Though this time she had added elongated branches to her natural markings, and prosthetics to change the shape of her brow and jawline, Kaeden had recognized her.

Riyo Chuchi laughed, putting a hand to her hip. “Unless someone’s invented a shrink ray while I wasn’t looking, there won’t be any vents for you. Hi, Kaeden.”

Kaeden blanched, clearly not expecting the other woman to have remembered her name. Kix had to wonder about that too.

“Hi.” Kaeden managed, shortly and a moment too late. “We have to go now. Goodbye.”

She grabbed Miara by the elbow, and pulled her determinedly towards the door. “What —? _Kaeden!_ ”

“So,” Riyo said, staring after the departing girls with a strange half-smile on her face. Though the strangeness could have been the prosthetics. “Ready to make history?”

Their destination was not Thomas Toov’s stronghold.

This was a man who remembered the High Republic, who had kept his greatest asset secret for hundreds of years. Even if he was, reportedly, more than halfway to senile the same could not be said for his security. There were rumors of a sentient A.I. capable of tracking down anyone who didn’t belong, no matter how many credentials they stole.

It might have been possible to get in, with a Jedi’s help. But that would make it obvious who was behind the theft. There weren’t that many Jedi left in the galaxy and Toov was, ostensibly an upstanding citizen of the Empire with the ability to report them. Kix had dismissed the idea immediately.

Which was why they were going after a sample in transit.

Not that going after Crimson Dawn under its current, shadowy leader had that much better odds.

One of Tano’s people had gone through Crimson Dawn’s shipping schedule and found a ship delivering a dose of the drug that would be stopping midway to its destination to drop off its load of spice. Though Toov usually demanded the drug be delivered directly, this customer was far across the galaxy, and Crimson Dawn had insisted on the stop.

They docked at a Crimson Dawn-owned station in a sector where nearly every planet payed the gang tribute, using a refueling stop on the way to pick up new tools for a mine as an excuse. Riyo used an identity of that had made similar runs in the past. She even had a Crimson Dawn access card she refused to explain the providence of.

He suspected bribery. Riyo was fond of bribery, for an ex-senator.

It felt just as strange to be walking the halls of a station in a nondescript flight suit as it once had to dress like an Alderaanian. Kix had no experience with subterfuge.

Which was why he’d brought along Riyo Chuchi. Only she seemed to have a very different idea of the meaning of the word discretion.

“So. Your friend is cute.” Riyo said casually, like this was an ordinary stroll. She carried a datapad in one hand, and a cold storage briefcase that could reach the temperature at which all biological activity stopped in the other, swinging it back and forth like it was not a fifty-thousand credit piece of equipment.

Kix raised a brow at her. “You waited to have this discussion while we’re slinking through enemy territory rather than on the flight here?”

Riyo shrugged, unrepentant. “Better odds of you answering honestly. And making small talk is the opposite of suspicious. Is she still single?”

Though some med students managed to date, Kix wasn’t sure how. Even back in the GAR, he hadn’t felt this married to his work. Kaeden had gone on a few first dates, early in their acquaintance, but they’d tapered off as she began helping with his research. But back when he’d first teased her about her reaction to the good ex-senator, Kaeden had claimed she wanted stability in a partner. A quality no rebel could have. “She doesn’t date rebels.”

“Hmm. Too bad.” Riyo looked down at the display on her datapad. “They should be docking in five, four..” She counted the rest of the way down to zero silently on her fingers.

The couriers would leave for thirty minutes to go through paperwork and bureaucracy. They needed to be in, out, and gone by the time the gangsters came back.

Reaching the last turn before the gangsters’ dock, Kix peered around the corner, waiting. A minute later, the iris opened Out stepped a helmeted humanoid, along with a hairless, six-armed being with pastel purple skin who towered over their companion. They disappeared down the hall in the opposite direction. That should be the whole team. There _might_ be a third crew member on board, but it would be a tight squeeze.

When they didn’t come back after another minute, he waved Riyo forward.

He kept his blaster up and at the ready, keeping an eye on each side of the hallway so Riyo could get them inside. She stashed her datapad in a pocket of her flight suit, and retrieved a scanner. Riyo attached the cord of her scanner to the lock, and set to work slicing it open.

There was a bing, and the iris hissed open. Riyo drew her own blaster and vanished inside. The sound of a stun blaster echoed out a moment later. “They left the pilot behind!” She called out. “Working on the cold storage lock now!”

So he kept to his post, instead of running inside.

Fortunate he did, because they didn’t have the promised half hour window. The wannabee-Mandalorian and their intimidating friend returned the way they’d come, and stopped short at the sight of Kix standing in front of their ship. They were quick to react, but Kix was faster, letting off two bolts in quick succession. The first went through the humanoid’s right shoulder, but the second went wide.

The other gangster was already charging toward, too fast for Kix to get off an accurate shot before he was tackled to the floor. Two arms went straight for his throat, the others holding him down so he couldn’t so much as twitch. Except at the jaw.

This species had a long, flat protrusion that might have been a nose that fell just within his reach. That was what saved him.

Hoping their skin wasn’t poisonous, Kix bit down as spots began to dance before his eyes. With a discordant, squealing scream, the courier let go with four of their hands to clasp them over their face, and eased up enough with the other two that he was able to break their hold.

Kix managed to get off a shot in the center of the chest — he might not recognize the species, but they had too much muscle not to have a centralized circulatory system, so there should be an artery there - as his opponent recovered enough to grab him again. A violet stain spread rapidly from the blaster hole, but the gangster seemed determined to squeeze the life from Kix as it fled him.

Dropping his blaster, Kix clawed at the hands, trying to keep them from crushing his larynx just long enough for the gangster to die. The sound of blaster bolts echoed overhead, but Kix was a little preoccupied with avoiding strangulation.

After what seemed like hours, but was more likely less than a minute, based on the amount of time an aortic injury took to bleed out, the grip on his throat went slack. Dropped. The body slumped over sideways.

Kix gasped for breath, feeling at his throat. Intact, but he would definitely need bacta for severe bruising and swelling on the ride back.

“A little help would be nice!” Riyo darted out from the doorway long enough to fire off a shot, and out of the way just in time for a bolt to whizz past, followed by the sound of something shattering.

She looked upside down, because Kix was still lying on his back. Right.

Grabbing his blaster, he propped himself up on an elbow, trying to get a sense of the situation without making himself a more obvious target.

Riyo’s problem was that it would take a sharpshooter to hit the humanoid from inside the ship, but the humanoid had a perfect line to the door. H

However many years she’d been keeping just one step ahead of danger carrying incriminating and encrypted messages across the galaxy, the former senator did not have that kind of training. Neither did Kix.

But he did have a better shot. His frame jolted with the recoil as he pulled the trigger. The humanoid’s body skidded back into the wall.

“Did you get it?” Kix asked, still feeling breathless.

“Got it!” She held up the cold storage briefcase proudly.

“We should make our exit.” Riyo helped him up, and they started off down the hall.

A wet sounding cough pulled them up short. Kix spun around, firing off another bolt.

The humanoid one, not quite dead, had already dragged themself up the wall and pulled on the emergency switch. They slid down the wall, unmoving, only a moment too late.

An alarm began to sound.

“Run!” He grabbed the briefcase from Riyo’s hands took off at full speed back in the direction of the ship. The sound of her footsteps echoed off the metal floor behind mind.

Kix rounded the corner and knocked an Ithorian to the ground. As the Ithorian merely looked stunned, Kix figured they were probably just an ordinary spice trader. But black-suited guards came streaming out of a connecting hallway they had just passed.

Worse, the doors lining the hallway began to close as the blaring of the alarm grew louder and more obnoxious. Kix half turned to exchange a volley of shots with the guards as he slipped through the first set of doors. Only the front three made it through after them, but those were also the active shooters. Kix took down one, but that left two others.

Who were undoubtedly fresh and not recently strangled. The others could get through with their access cards at any moment.

“Three doors to our dock!” Riyo shouted.

Her shorter legs made it difficult to keep up and shoot at the same time. Kix made it through the second set of doors in time, but Riyo’s arm got stuck. It was not, fortunately, the type of door that closed with enough force to amputate. But she screamed as she pulled it through.

The next set of doors was already closed. “They’ll assume we’re stuck, or need some time to break through.” Riyo used her uninjured arm to fish a card out of her pockets. “But we need to hurry.”

Those doors, and the final ones let them through at the touch of her access card. Riyo was able to detach their ship from the station against the docking officer’s protests. Her identity was irrefutably burned, but they had made it out alive.

Carrying hope with them.

Kix returned to the organized disaster zone he called his lab to find it pulsing to the beat of a popular, angsty boyband’s latest hit. A datapad balanced precariously on a stack of centrifuge tube holders was displayed a spreadsheet, but Kaeden was pacing back and forth to the rhythm of the boys begging their lover — who seemed to have dated all of them — to come back.

He knocked on the doorframe, and she scrambled for the mute button.

“One sample of immortality elixir, acquired!” Kix announced.

Kaeden took one look at the bacta patches around his throat and threw up her hands. “Did you get _strangled?_ ”

He shrugged. “Only a little. My neck will be fine by tomorrow, with the bacta.”

Riyo slinked in behind him and threw herself into the ergonomically correct chair Kix had acquired against the university’s regulations on account of his back. Not feeling like his spine was dissolving in acid was more important than a 100% rating from the health and safety office, in his opinion.

“Only a little? A little strangled.” Kaeden laughed, a little hysterical. “If that’s a little strangled, at least you didn’t get _a little stabbed_.”

“Exactly.” Kix knew she was being sarcastic, but a little strangled _was_ far better than a little stabbed.

She groaned loudly, burying her arms in her hands. “Run your stupid sample on the spectrometers before I decide a little strangling isn’t enough.”

Was it a general trait of pacifists to threaten violence when someone got injured? Kaeden sounded like a less extreme version of the former Duchess of Kalevala. “Toss me the cryo gloves and I’ll get on it.” He pointed to where they were sitting near her desk, on top of the liquid nitrogen tank.

She did so, hissing, “Why did you bring your partner in crime back with you?”

Riyo answered for him. A good thing, since he was elbows deep in a compartment that would give him frostbite on contact if it touched skin. “I’m crashing at his place tonight. If he gave me the keys, I’d just pass out and not be able to let him in. So here I am, not sleeping.”

“Is the life of a spy not as glamorous as advertised? _Please_ tell my sister that.” Kaeden knew damn well her sister had no aspirations to espionage. But Kix also knew she had no plans of acknowledging that any time soon.

Using clamp tongs, he quickly transferred the tube containing the drug to a chamber that would raise the temperature until it thawed, without shattering the tube. And without taking a whole standard day.

_Just melt it in a cold room_ , the resource allocations department had said back in the Gar, _or the air for all I care, we don’t have the budget_. And then there would be a surprise engagement and half that things Kix needed to treat any injured men or reckless Jedi were still frozen. Kix was hauling this thing back to Atollon whether Senator Organa said he could or not.

“I sleep in my ship most nights. But I’m more of a courier, most of the time.” Frowning, Riyo absently massaged the joint of her shoulder. “It’s been a long time since I did something like this. Back when I was a senator, I think.”

“Back when you were a _what_?” Kaeden squeaked.

The device beeped. Kix quickly extracted an aliquot, and stored the remainder in the -140-degree freezer. The aliquot he split between the mass and electromagnetic spectrometers, and the gene sequencer, in case the drug used any nucleic acids.

“Not now, obviously. Pantora doesn’t even have senate representation anymore. ‘Too unruly’ apparently.” Riyo explained with more than a hint of pride, still massaging her shoulder. “We Pantorans are very outspoken.”

And the current Moff of the Sujimis Sector was the other kind of outspoken Pantoran: the asshole kind.

Kaeden frowned. “Your shoulder —”

“Oh? Yes, right.” Riyo rolled her shoulder and winced. “I pulled it when a door closed on it during our escape.”

“Sit down, let me look at that.” Business like, Kaeden felt around Riyo’s shoulder socket and the surrounding muscle before moving to her back. Riyo hissed as she pressed on a point on her rotator cuff. “Now try to press my hand up with your bicep.” She held her hand up at shoulder height and pushed down as Riyo pressed up. “It looks like you tore your rotor cuff, and your shoulder is out of alignment. Let’s get it scanned, and I’ll requisition an injection to the repair the muscle.”

“Can you do that, as a med student?” Riyo looked up at Kaeden from under her lashes. Still trying even after his warning, he saw. Well, it wasn’t like Kaeden was the sort of person who struggled with turning someone down.

“Technically, no. But Kix has special permissions, and it’s not like you can go to the hospital.” Yes, because he was a licensed (formerly, due his status as a wanted man) medic, not just a med student. But if Kaeden wanted to show off, far be it from him to interfere. “Kix, I’m using your password!”

He waved her off, frowning at the poor baseline on the spectrum the electromagnetic spectrometer had spat out. There was no way he could identify nuclei on that. Why did supposedly automatically calibrated devices only work properly one out of one hundred times? Kix was not a technician. He had no clue how to fix that.

All he could do was run it again, and hope for a different result. At least the other machines were more reliable, even if it would take until tomorrow to get results.

“Ok, it’ll be in tomorrow. In the meantime, let me pop that back into place and tape it.” Kaeden was saying.

There was a pop, and Riyo gasped. “Oh! That’s — thank you.”

Kix looked over, and saw her looking up at Kaeden with something like awe.

“You shouldn’t ignore pain like that. The injections work best the faster they’re applied.” Kaeden’s hands were lingering far too long with each piece of orthopedic tape she applied — orthopedic tape she’d definitely stolen from Kix’s desk, since her idea of a nice workout was a leisurely walk, now that she didn’t have to farm from dawn to dusk — to be professional.

Kix was suddenly highly invested in seeing where this went. Almost as invested as he was in wrestling this damn spectrometer into submission.

_Step 6. Hang out with royalty_

Whenever Kix needed to contact anyone on Atollon, he had to have dinner with the Alderaanian Royal Family first. He had no idea who decided this was the least suspicious way for a no-name med student to use encrypted frequencies. All he knew was that it had resulted in him having to learn which fork was used for which dish. This confusion was made worse by the fact that outside of formal events, all the dishes were served at once.

The seven-year-old princess had better manners than him, and she still refused to eat her peas.

His only consolation was that this time, Kaeden had come along. When it came to fine dining, she was still a farm girl.

“I read something interesting today,” Kix said, as he attempted to use the salad fork to spear some leafy greens.

“Oh?” Senator Organa asked with polite interest.

Queen Breha continued to discuss the princess’ lessons of the day with the girl, while the princess’ nurse droid ladled a scoop of peas onto her plate every time she tried to roll them surreptitiously onto the ground.

For unknown reasons, Senator Amidala’s former protocol droid was seated at the table, commenting on the fine weave of the tablecloth, though no one was listening. Except Kaeden, who had made the mistake of mentioning she sewed, and was searching for an escape that would not come.

Kix quoted a recent article from the Aldera Sun. “Mid-rim University scientist discovers medicine that slows aging by reducing telomere deterioration.”

“I could not, of course, know anything about a formula stolen from a well-respected elder of the arts community.” Bail Organa said with a wink.

Any man who had never had a crush on Bail Organa was either aromantic, or too straight to be salvageable.

“Of course not.” Kix finally got enough leaves for a bite onto his fork, and neither blushed nor stumbled over his words. He was a clone who could handle a little offhand punch to the gut from the attractiveness of a happily married man. Unlike some others he could name. “Dr. Xind’s publication is very timely. His research into nucleotide alteration in the adult genome outside traditional gene therapy has been underfunded. He’ll benefit from this discovery greatly.”

Some of the drug’s ingredients hadn’t exactly been cheap, but they weren’t prohibitively expensive, if their goal was to slow aging, rather than stop it. No ingredients came from the ground tooth of the last zillo beast or anything ethically indefensible. It had been run through an extensive battery of tests on cells and animals before Kix tried it on himself — a decision deemed relatively safe, given the drug had been in use for hundreds of years, and done the opposite of kill people.

His cells were dividing at the rate of naturally born humans. Kix felt like he could breath easily for the first time in his life.

“Yes, as will the many researchers who can use his work in direct medical applications.” The Senator sipped his wine, the same fancy kind he kept sending to Atollon despite repeated protests that they had enough of it to last a century, thanks.

Kix gave up on the greens, and switched to the thin slices of marinated nuna, drizzled in an iridescent blue sauce that crackled on his tongue. “It sounds like this aging drug will too. It’s being put to the test in trials for treating degenerative diseases, as well as extending ordinary lives.

Kix didn’t think it was right to keep the results of his heist from the rest of the galaxy, since it could be mass produced at the lower dose. Not to mention, if he wanted to be able to distribute it to as many of his surviving brothers as possible, he couldn’t rely on being able to find them all.

He had no illusions that it would be made available to everyone. But centering production on Ringo Vinda and ensuring the formula leaked would keep it from being kept exclusive to elites in the core. They’d have it, but so would others.

The Organas knew all this, of course, but dinner conversations at the palace were always unassailable in their blandness. Just in case some Imperial managed to sneak a listening device into the plates again.

“Will any of the trials be taking place here on Alderaan?” He asked as he dove into the fluffy cloud of sugar that called itself desert. Always the best part of any palace meal.

“We’re looking into hosting phase two trials at the Aldera Research Hospital’s Degenerative Disease Center.” The Senator replied, which actually was news to him.

On his other side, Kaeden’s eyes had glazed over as the protocol droid described the traditional process of dying threads in gradients of near whites from a small town on the other side of Alderaan.

The end of dinner was signaled when Princess Evaan fell asleep in the remains of her noodles.

The encrypted holotable was kept in an ordinary meeting room, and gave the appearance of being out of order to anyone who wandered in. It could only be switched on with a series of regularly changed passcodes, and only when curtains were drawn over both the exterior and interior windows.

Senator Organa keyed in the current codes, and left them to it.

Rex answered the call from Tano’s office, the Jedi spymaster herself visible in the background, pretending not to listen as she went over the schematics of a device.

Rolling his eyes and smiling at something she said out of range of the microphone, Rex asked, “You said you had a breakthrough?”

Though Kix tried to keep them updated with his progress, he hadn’t actually explained the purpose of his heist, letting them assume it was related to the chips. If his hope for a longer life had turned out to be nothing, the only broken heart would have been his.

“Actually, Sir, I think Master Tano might want to listen in.” Tano might have won the war of attrition in getting Rex to call her by her given name, but Kix wasn’t budging. He would respect the Jedi’s desire not to be called by their military ranks any longer, but surnames were as far as he would go. Preferably with Master attached.

Tano wheeled her chair over in the space of a blink. “Were you successful?” She narrowed her eyes. “ Is that Kaeden Larte?”

“Hi.” Kaeden waved. “I’m his lab assistant.”

“Not with the chips, not yet.” Excitement boiled under his skin, and Kix couldn’t help a giddy grin. “This is something else. Remember that heist I went on?”

“The one where you burned one of our best couriers?” Tano asked, her otherwise good-natured smile showing fangs. If there was a next time, she was definitely making him give her a mission plan.

Warning heard and understood.

“No, the other one.” He said, deadpan. Kix would not be a clone if he didn’t sass his superior officer in any exchange outside of a direct order. “Yes, that heist. She’s still on my couch, by the way.” After Crimson Dawn blew ten of her aliases, which she’d discovered to her detriment the next time she stopped by Nar Shaddaa, Riyo had decided to go to ground in Aldera City. For reasons that appeared to include flirting and taking up his space.

“You mean she’s still on _my_ couch playing hologames with _my_ sister.” Kaeden grumbled. Grumbled, but continued to let her through the front door, provide refreshments, and set up to study in the same room, despite the noise of the brightly colored holos.

“Kix, what did you steal?” Rex was a few standard months older than him at most, but he pulled off a tired dad voice disturbingly well.

Kix had never shaken the instinct to do as Rex said, when he used it. It was far worse than his giving orders voice, somehow. “A drug. A year’s worth for one person is already on the way to you. It’s specifically for Rex.”

“Why? Did you find something wrong in my samples?” Rex had sent a number of biological samples off with him, including live cells, since he was the only living clone other than Kix he had direct access to. He couldn’t do all of his testing on himself.

A sample size of two was scientifically horrible, but it wasn’t like they’d had other options.

“Nah. Despite that blond hair of yours,” which unlike Kix’s had yet to start turning gray. But Rex might be beginning to bald, and Kix would take graying over balding. He had grown the top of his hair out over his undercut over the years, until he could wear it in a simple, Alderaanian plait down his back. He thought he might keep it, even after he left. “You seem to have gotten all the good genes. This drug will help them stay that way.”

“What does that mean without speaking in riddles?” Rex sighed, rubbing his forehead above his left eye with the heel of his hand.

Kaeden elbowed him. “Stop messing with them.”

Yeah, he’d probably taken that far enough. “We’re going to age normally from now on.”

Stunned, Rex sat back in his chair so hard it scraped against the ground. “What.”

Tano looked like she might burst into tears, which was a disturbing thought. He’d seen little Commander Tano cry more than a few times, but this impossible, older one? Just wrong. “Do you mean…?”

“You have a lot more years with your young, hot clone boyfriend than you thought? It sure does.” Not enough _teasing,_ just enough delay in delivering the news. He would never be tired of teasing Rex. He was so eminently teasable these days.

“Kix!” Rex scolded him, but didn’t deny it. Hooray for progress. He also did not protest Tano tackling him out of his chair.

Kaeden smacked him on the shoulder. ”Stop calling yourself hot. I can’t take you seriously when you’re like this.”

“I’m only telling the truth.” He pointed out. Not all of them were paragons of morality like Rex. He’d had plenty of takers on leave, even after they realized Kix didn’t want to have a threesome with one of his brothers, thanks. And since the boys had stopped expecting him to have a double or ten around the corner, he’d had even better luck at bars.

Nothing serious, but he wasn’t looking for serious. Especially now that he had a lot more time to find it.

_Step 7. Find the off switch_

Despite the fancy software, piecing together a model of the chip had taken ages. Kaeden said that was a normal part of the scientific process, and Kix could not expect everything to go as quickly as testing a pre-existing drug they’d stolen. Kix thought the scientific process could go fuck itself.

When this was over, Kix was going to be a trauma surgeon and only a trauma surgeon for the rest of his life. A difficult surgery took hours, not _years_. Sealing an arterial bleed didn’t take five tries, on average, the way experiments did. Sure, recovery could take much longer, and there was often a need for multiple surgeries, but the success rate of each individual step was much higher.

It had to be. There were lives at stake.

(What Kix hadn’t missed was watching people die.)

He was rather looking forward to his year of residency in the xenosurgery ward of the hospital, which would make sure he _didn’t_ take five tries to seal a Toydarian’s artery the first time he had to alone in the field.

“—and _why_ is she so _hot?_ ” Kaeden paused mid incision. “Oh no.”

“Did you just realize ranting about your crush while implanting a killer chip in a rat’s brain might not be the most appropriate place?” Kix squeezed the dermal sealant onto one side of his own placebo rat’s incision and held the seams together for it to stick.

“I just realized I _have_ a crush.” Kaeden grumbled, but did resume her poor rat’s brain surgery. Riyo was still hiding out, but spent her downtime working in the costume department of the local theater. She was no longer living on his couch. Just confusing her own with Kaeden’s.

Kix had thought Kaeden knew and was just being stubborn. But no, this was a classic case of misinterpreting gay flirting as friendship. And he had a front row seat.

“What gave it away? The way you swoon every time she looks at you, or the fact that was the —” He looked down at the old, manual cell clicker-counter he’d been using to keep track, and clicked it one more time. “Thirty seventh time you’ve mentioned her looks today.”

“Shut up. I’m _allowed_ to think people are hot without being in love with them.”

“Who said anything about love?”

“I’m not falling for that trick — I’m not a teenager anymore.” She pointed her bloody scalpel at him.

“I’m just saying. All I said was you think she’s swoony and you talk about her eyes a lot.”

“They’re very golden.” She said sulkily. Kix duly clicked the cell counter again. “I _like_ her. But I’d have to get to know her better if I were to — for anything more.”

“So ask her to get kaf at that nice cafe she’s always bringing you breakfast from.” Despite ostensibly lying low, Riyo had bribed _someone_ in the student services office for a student ID and access to the lab building. She used that access exclusively to deliver freshly baked pastries and fancy lattes. When she didn’t just drop them at Kaeden’s in the morning.

(He was fairly certain she’d completed some sort of accelerated degree in political science before joining the Senate, but she had definitely never completed basic lab safety training.)

“Bringing _us_ breakfast. Because we’re _friends._ ” She protested, though _Kix_ did not get a personalized kaf order. “Besides, why would she be interested in me? She used to be a senator, she’s seen the galaxy, argued with the emperor, saved _Padmé Amidala’s_ life. And I’m just a farmgirl with aspirations of neurosurgery.”

“I don’t think you get to decide who Riyo’s into for her.” He pointed out.

“I’m not. It’s just not me.” Kaeden shrugged, seeming to believe that nonsense.

Kix sighed despairingly. It was clearly his lot in life to be saddled with friends, brothers, and colleagues who were absolutely useless at romance. Rex, Master Kenobi — though he might have worked things out with the deposed Duchess, finally, Rex hadn’t exactly been clear — and now Kaeden and Riyo.

All of them, useless.

When Kix found someone attractive, he simply asked them out. Yet he was the one with no prospects.

Riyo was never going to make an outright move. She didn’t want to push. Maybe Kix _should_ get involved. If the ninth version of the off-switch device actually worked without blowing a hole in the rats’ prefrontal cortex, or deregulating emotional control so the rats cried blood, or destroying their motor control.

It took a few days for the incisions to seal completely, and a week for the chips to integrate fully with the rats’ neurology. In the intervening time, he took his last midterms for his last semester of classes, skipped cardio twice, and went on the most boring date of his life. The man had been talking about music — specifically, the band he managed — but he might as well have been reading a directory.

Too bad. He’d been hot. And getting railed would have taken the edge off his nerves.

On the day of the experiment, Kaeden walked in with four thermoses of kaf in addition to her usual Riyo-supplied to go cup, setting them down on her desk. Their “office” space was just separate enough from the lab benches that food as allowed on a technicality, though there was no actual door. Groaning, she threw herself into her chair and spent a solid minute with her head on her desk.

“More midterms?” He asked.

“ _Why_ did I think taking a class with Belaan was a good idea?” She whined into her desk.

“Because his advanced neurobiology seminar is required for your specialty?” He reminded her. The nice thing about a more popular specialty like trauma was that there were always at least two professors to choose from for every required class. He hadn’t enrolled in a course taught by a grade deflating, stress inflating mynock like Belaan since his first year.

“I take it back, graduating isn’t important. Do you think Selda will hire me on as a waitress if I beg?”

“Take a break and come watch me probably kill our rats again. I won’t tell health and safety if you bring a thermos with you.” Kix patted her consolingly on the back, and began wheeling her chair towards the cages. She snatched a thermos from the carrier and cradled it close to her chest like a child’s security blanket.

… Which was actually a good description of every med student’s relationship to kaf.

Kaeden accepted the free ride and did nothing to help him move her along. Kix lined her up to watch the cages and grabbed the Off Switch. It was a small, handheld ultrasonic frequency emitter that curved over the ledge of his forefinger, with a single switch positioned where he could flick it with his thumb.

Such a simple thing, and it had the potential to save his brothers. Or kill all these rats.

“The digital model seemed to respond to this frequency by simply turning off the cell functions, and predicted the cells would simply be degraded by enzymes over time and remodeled into normal prefrontal cortex tissue.” Kaeden said.

“Here’s to hoping it won’t kill the rest of the brain along with the chips.” He knocked his fist against her thermos in a toast to success. Breathing in sharply, he ordered, “Execute Order 66.”

The rats implanted with the real chip hissed and lunged forward for the bars, while the rats with the sham continued to laze about in their cages. Rats couldn’t actually differentiate Jedi from any other larger creature, so they seemed to lash out wildly when that order was activated. They’d found that out when first testing the chips.

Order 66, unfortunately, got the best reaction. Most of the other orders were too complex for their little rat brains to understand.

Kix, on the other hand, felt a bone deep instinct to run so far away no orders could reach him. A phantom pain echoed in his head. A physiological response to the memory of trauma and not, so far as several types of brain scans could tell, a sign of anything wrong.

He flipped the switch and — the rats stopped screeching. Stopped clawing for escape. One of them chattered, confused. Another sped to the water bowl.

“Execute Order 33. Execute Order 17.” Kix tried a litany of orders, with no response. He flicked the switch back to the off position, so the frequency was no longer transmitting. Tried again.

Nothing.

The rats were just rats.

“It works?” He had to drop the device on the nearby lab bench as his fingers went limp. Disbelieving shock filled his chest, followed by a slow build of excitement. “Force, it works!”

He wanted to punch the air. Pop some confetti and dance until he dropped. Find a room with echoing acoustics and scream.

“We still need to monitor them, then sacrifice them and look at any changes to the tissue, and test bio—” Kaeden tried to temper his expectations with logic, but she was grinning too.

“Biological replicates, I know.” Important, but let him have this moment first. Logic could wait.

“And scale up to larger animals and —”

“Find some of my brothers who are willing to test it, _I know_.” Rex seemed to know a few who were likely candidates, off on Saleucami. The story of how he’d found the first of them had been pried out only several drinks in on a boy’s night. Kix was indirectly responsible for Rex having to rethink his entire life, apparently. “Let me be excited for once. Kriff, I was starting to think we’d never get there.”

“It _is_ pretty exciting.” She admitted, her grin widening into something genuinely bright.

They’d found the solution. Call it a message from the Force, but Kix could _feel_ it.

_Step 8. Play love doctor?_

Kaeden first became suspicious when Miara hid her datapad from sight and giggled. But she assumed it had something to do with her delinquent friends in the planetary defense force, or her ongoing plans to abscond to the Rebellion. Maybe even planning a first ever third date with someone who didn’t mind her awful sense of humor, but definitely didn’t deserve her.

In hindsight, a lifetime of being an older sister should have tipped her off to the fact that _that_ smirk could only come from plotting against her.

Nevertheless, Kaeden was blindsided when on the first evening of the short break between her entire life being consumed by textbooks and her entire life being consumed by patient care, there was a knock on the door. Interrupting her cherished plans for lazing around on the couch in her rattiest and most comfortable pair of sweats, a bucket of chocolate-drizzed popcorn, and a classic holomovie they hadn’t had on Raada. Kaeden had only recently discovered that there were kids’ musicals about dancing lizard monkeys reclaiming their planet. It had apparently been an inexcusable omission.

(Even _Kix_ had known about it, and he’d grown up in clone school. Apparently there were weekly movie nights, for the younger clones.)

Kaeden felt she deserved her time alone and undisturbed. The years of lab work were complete. Graduation was in three days, residency a month away. There was, for once, no unfairly attractive former Pantoran senator on her couch, distracting her with her stupid, sparkly gold eyes. And she had not ordered delivery.

Some solicitor selling evaporators was not going to ruin her evening.

Miara, the traitor, went to answer the door. “Did you get the tickets? And convince her to come?”

“Two tickets to Cygnets of Aubrry Lake, and yeah, she’ll be here in half an hour or so.” Worse than a traitor, it was Kix. Kix with tickets and plans he had convinced a woman other than Kaeden to join.

She had a bad feeling about this.

The last time Kix had a plan, he robbed a galactically renowned criminal and pissed off a gang. If Miara thought this plan was a good idea, it could only be worse.

Miara turned off the holoprojector, and confronted her with her hands on her hips. “Go change. You can’t wear that on a date.”

“On a _what_?” In retrospect, Kaeden should have known exactly what they were plotting from the moment those words left her sister’s mouth. But in the moment, all she could think was _but I haven’t asked anyone out in a year_.

“I don’t think Riyo would mind you wearing that, given those pants are _barely_ on your hips. Unfortunately, I don’t think they’ll let you through the door at the ballet.” Kix was at least nicer about — wait, what? “Go put on something nice.”

Riyo? Ballet? Date? What?

“At the what? Riyo?” Words came out of her mouth in an order. They might have made sense. Or not. She didn’t know. What _did_ finally click was that they planned to wreck her long-awaited night in. “And, _no_. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Yes, you are.” Miara pushed her into the bathroom, and threw something silky onto her head, sliding the door shut with a bang. Locking Kaeden inside.

“Let me out of here, you little ragweed!” Kaeden rattled the doorknob and kicked at the useless metal contraption.

“I’m not letting you out until you’re wearing that and fix your hair!” She singsonged.

“You’re grounded until you’re forty!” She practically raised Miara by herself and _this_ was the thanks she got. Left with no choice, Kaeden started stripping.

“You can’t ground me, I’m an adult with a job!” Despite her claims, the distinct _unnnh_ sound that accompanied Miara sticking out her tongue like a five-year-old followed.

She pulled her shirt over her head and whipped it into the door, producing considerably less of a bang than she’d hoped for. “Try me!”

Miara might know how to hit a moving target with a Y-wing’s laser canon, but their bank accounts were still in Kaeden’s name.

The silky item turned out to be a golden sheath dress Kaeden did not remember buying. She held it up in front of her, and groaned again. Kaeden would have chosen something a bit less flashy, but unfortunately, she couldn’t fault Miara’s taste. She stepped into it and reached around her back to pull up the zipper.

It fit, so she couldn’t get out of whatever this was by claiming otherwise. And it did, admittedly, flatter her figure. As for her hair, she’d just redone her braids that morning, temporarily defeating the frizz of a month’s wear. “I’m wearing this monstrosity you forced on me and my hair is fine, let me out!”

Miara took one look at her, and pronounced, “No.” Dragging Kaeden along by the wrist, she grabbed a chair and plopped it down in front of the mirror covering the living room closet that Kaeden had always found disconcerting. “Sit.”

With a lengthy sigh, Kaeden sat. Miara immediately began fussing with her hair, pulling far too hard on the braids as she coiled them into an updo that would be impossible to do on herself. Clearly, Miara had always intended to cause her this pain. “Are either of you going to tell me what the _hell_ is going on?”

“You and Riyo have been dancing around each other for _ages_ , and honestly? We’re sick of it.” She pulled her hair into a twist that Kaeden wasn’t sure she could undo without chopping off half her hair, and pinned it there with no regard with for Kaeden’s poor, abused scalp.

And then she retrieved the glitter. Kaeden was going to be dealing with the aftereffects of tonight for a _month_. And Miara’s efforts were going to be useless. Kix had probably promised Riyo a group thing. If it was just Kaeden, it would just make things awkward. What if she thought _Kaeden_ had planned this?

There would be an empty spot on her couch in the future.

As much as Kaeden had complained about Riyo ruining her life, she would miss her.

“I decided I’m going to stop this train wreck.” Kix leaned against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest, the dreaded ballet tickets dangling from one hand. _Ballet_. Really. “And your sister has agreed to help me.”

“Miara.” She said through gritted teeth, as her sister attacked her eyelids with gold glitter. “I’m going to murder you.”

“But we planned this nice date for you! You can’t murder me for wanting you to be happy.” Putting on an innocent act, Miara fluttered her eyelashes.

Kaeden was well aware that at least 75% of the reason Miara was involved in this was because she wanted Kaeden off her back. 20% was probably a little sister’s desire to embarrass her big sister. If she was lucky, _maybe_ 5% was a genuine desire for Kaeden to be happy.

Therefore she was absolutely within her sisterly rights to commit murder. It was right there in the fine print.

“I did not agree to this — Hi.” The front door opened mid-sentence. In the face of Riyo Chuchi, Kaeden promptly forgot what she’d been complaining about.

Kaeden had come to revise her original opinion of Riyo Chuchi’s looks. Out of disguise, she was in contention for most beautiful person Kaeden had ever laid eyes on. In that flowing gold and turquoise gown ( _matching,_ her sister’s voice teased within her — or, no, that was out loud), she might just be the front runner. The gown contrasted with the lavender tint of her skin to flatter her markings and made her eyes seem to glow, stealing the moisture from Kaeden’s throat.

“Hi.” Riyo replied, and smiled. Kaeden utterly lost the ability to speak.

She stared, and Riyo stared back.

“You two need to go or you’ll be late.” Kix said, as Miara began to wave a hand between their eyes, disrupting her perfect view. He grabbed Kaeden by the shoulders and pushed her out her own front door, slamming it shut after her. The tickets had somehow ended up in her hand.

Hammering on it with her fist, she shouted, “Hey, that’s my house!”

Riyo giggled, covering her mouth with her hand. A girlish thing, a rare reminder that she was not much older than Kaeden — and her achievements were all the more impressive for it. Whatever Kix and Miara might think, Riyo Chuchi was so far out of her league she could walk to Mandalore faster than reach her.

“Are you uh— do you—” She stammered. What was she supposed to say to a girl who had been tricked into going on a date with her?

But Riyo laughed again, this time with a touch of irony. “They didn’t warn you about this at all, did they?”

That was easier ground. Kaeden could always find the words to complain about her sister. “My night in was very rudely disrupted.”

“If you don’t want to—” Riyo bit her lip, which was very… hmm.

“I don’t think they’ll let me back in for the next few hours.” They were probably watching them on the viewscreen, giggling over her awkwardness as she spoke. “Did you know about this?”

Riyo shrugged to one side. “Sort of.”

Kaeden took that to mean she had known about the ballet, but not the date. “Then uh, if you want to see this show—”

“I do.” Riyo said.

That was that. “Then lets not waste these tickets.”

She wasn’t tall, but Riyo was tiny. Walking beside her, Kaeden felt gangly and awkward. Uncultured. Riyo walked in heels that could easily be used as a dagger with ease. Elegant and unphased, while Kaeden stumbled over what felt like every crack in the pavement.

(There were not many cracks in the pavement, because this was Alderaan. She was mostly tripping over her own feet.)

Her tongue felt thick in her mouth, but Riyo seemed happy to fill in the gaps, telling her how an actor in the play she was currently working on at one of the smaller, indie theaters, had ruined the test run of his elaborate makeup within ten minutes, by sobbing his way through a dramatic scene, forcing her to find alternatives that stuck better on a budget.

Kaeden laughed at the appropriate moments, and gradually found herself feeling lighter. It felt like no time at all before they reached the stone steps leading up to the pillared entrance to the opera.

In her nearly six years on Alderaan, Kaeden had not so much as set foot in the Royal Opera House. On the rare occasion that she had the time and energy for an entertainment event, it was usually stand up comedy night at Selda’s, where she could catch up with folks from Raada, or a concert with friends from school. The occasional play might be fun, if she had time, but ballet had never crossed her mind.

“I didn’t think ballet was your style.” Riyo commented as they claimed a pair of drinks in fine glasses. The usual teal wine Alderaanians were so proud of, though she found it more bitter than the sweet, and over-carbonated. It gave her the _worst_ hangovers.

“Kix bought the tickets.” She admitted. “But I am open to new experiences.” New experiences that did not involve throwing herself off cliffs, or climbing mountains, or any kind of extended exercise, extreme or otherwise. Even if she hated the ballet, it would be an improvement on her ex.

Not that she was at all sure she _should_ be dating Riyo, if this was a date. Though Riyo had been in hiding for the better part of a year, she was still a spy.

Sorry, “courier,” though Kaeden did not see the distinction. Riyo seemed to do a lot more breaking and entering than should be required to pick up a data drop from spies embedded in the Empire, or smuggling as an excuse for data-gathering planetary flyovers.

Kaeden’s attraction to women remained proportionate to the likelihood of being widowed by her thirtieth birthday.

Determined though they were to ruin her life, she didn’t think Kix and Miara had chosen a ballet with the expectation of them _watching_ it.

Especially once they were directed to the royal family’s box, empty that night save for them.

Kaeden decided she must, therefore, prove them wrong. It wasn’t like Riyo would actually want to make out with her in a dark theater anyways. They’d scarcely spoken since entering the box, and every time she looked over, Riyo was looking away. Down at the same page of the novelty program, or up at the gilt squares of the art deco ceiling. Anywhere but at Kaeden.

She would just get through the performance, bid Riyo an awkward goodnight, and go murder her sister and so-called friend.

No matter how much she wanted to go hide in the water closet until the ordeal was all over.

Kaeden exhaled in relief when the curtains rose. But her relief did not last long. The dancers appeared to be very dramatically having problems with each other, but she didn’t know how to tell them apart.

A half hour in, Kaeden had no choice but to conclude that ballet was not for her. Her eyes glazed over, and she paid the stage only passing attention until intermission.

When the curtains fell, Riyo took one look at her and burst out laughing. “I’m guessing this new experience isn’t going well. Maybe I should have doubted Kix more when he said our date would be at the ballet. You only get distracted from studying when there’s a comedy on.”

So this _was_ a date? Did that mean — well, probably not, after Kaeden failed to enjoy her idea of a good time.

“I’m more of a dive bar and board games kind of girl, usually.” If that was a dealbreaker, well — she was bored out of her mind. Better to find out they were a poor match now, than pretend to be someone she wasn’t, and disappoint later.

“I’ll tell you a secret.” Riyo whispered in her ear, her breath sending tingles down Kaeden’s spine. “I still have no idea what the show is about. What would you say to finding a bar, and having some actual fun?”

All of the blood in Kaeden’s body rushed to her face (a medical impossibility, yes, but she would have sworn it).

She said yes.

Riyo’s idea of a dive bar did not qualify as a dive, but it was possible that was just Alderaan. There was at least a hint of white in every building, and it was always scrubbed pristine. This one had its white in a sign, alternating in a circle with black to form a target. And it did have games, if you counted billball.

With a nice, frothy, _appropriately_ carbonated beer in hand, Kaeden was no more certain what she was doing, but at least she had beer. The cue in her hands wasn’t as natural as sliding a game piece into place for the perfect strategic gambit, but she had not problems with scattering the balls across the table, sending them careering into the obstacles. One of the star-speckled set rolled into a corner pocket. The pocket, on the fritz, made a sound more like a child screaming than the usual cheering.

“That makes me spaceships, then.” Riyo said. Kaeden had an awkward angle for her next shot, and missed, making it her turn.

“So, why did you say you wanted to go to the ballet, if you don’t like ballet?” She asked as Riyo made her shot. Her arm jerked, and instead of making an easy, direct shot into a pocket, the white cue ball hit the suction tube, which ate it, and spit it out violently from a spot at the opposite end of the table. The cue ball bounced into others and off of the physical only barriers, finally rolling to a stop near the center of the table.

Riyo raised a brow, giving her an unimpressed look. But Riyo hadn’t grown up with the most obnoxious little sister in the galaxy and learned to play fair. “Ballet is beautiful and impressive, but I find it hard to sit through. Some of the livelier ones can be fun, though.”

That was not an answer. Kaeden said as much, as she leaned across the table to take advantage of the cue ball’s convenient location.

She sent one of her balls into its pocket, which made a much less ear-splitting sound than the first. But as she lined up the next, Riyo answered. “I’ve been trying to convince you to go on a date with me for the past year and we already had tickets.”

She missed the shot. “Oh.”

“Is that a good no or a bad no?” Riyo climbed up to sit on the table, balancing the cue between her legs. The gold in her dress made her look like she was glowing, in the dim bar lighting, and the slit revealed far too much of the cornflower blue of her thigh, defining the muscle built by her kickboxing routine.

On the one hand, her face was flushed, and Kaeden was more flustered than she’d been in her entire _life_. On the other: reality. Kaeden had always been pragmatic. She’d needed to be, raising her sister after their parents died, rationing what little she had. It protected her heart, and would help her to keep going the first time she lost a patient. 

Riyo, though, was tempting. Kaeden leaned against her own cue, thinking, staring off in the direction of a group of bickering university students. Riyo made her laugh, made her appreciated. Worse, she made Kaeden think she would always be there, when there was a good chance she wouldn’t. But was that enough to take a risk? “I haven’t decided yet.”

“Kix told me, a while back, that you wouldn’t want to date me, because of what I do.” Riyo bounced a leg, revealing _more_ of that creamy expanse of her thigh, and Kaeden was going to have a heart attack before she could get revenge for Kix revealing her secret.

(No, she had not told Kix in confidence. Kaeden had been very open about her dating rules since they met. But the desire for a little friendly revenge was not a rational thing.)

A year ago, she would have said exactly that. Now, it was more complicated. “I like you. I do. But I’m worried that, if we do this, you’re going to break my heart.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” Riyo shrugged, as though it were that simple.

“You’re on the hit list of an intragalactic criminal syndicate and the Empire.” Kaeden flatly pointed out.

“Not very high on either list. I’m just a mildly annoying mosquito, compared to some of my friends.” Riyo smiled at her own joke. And, making Kaeden’s heart stop, winked, “And who’s to say you won’t break _my_ heart.”

A breakup was very different from death. “Ok, make your case.”

“See that bartender over there? The blond one who’s probably from Gatalenta, with the rainbow eyeshadow?” Riyo pointed out a cute woman behind the bar, who showcased a level of colorful flamboyancy rarely seen among Alderaan’s determinedly subdued color palette. “If you dated her, what are the chances it would work out? What if an accident happened?”

“I’m afraid of that too. But it’s a lot lower risk, than the way you put yourself in danger every day.” A bartender might get into a speeder accident. Riyo threw herself in the path of blasters on a regular basis. There _was_ a difference.

“I won’t be, for a while.” Despite what Riyo had said about her placement on those hit lists, she seemed to have pulled one over one to many times on someone in the upper echelons of Crimson Dawn. It would be risky for her and other rebels to leave. “Why not see where this goes?”

Kaeden wasn’t ready to answer that question. “I… it’s your turn.”

Riyo took her turn, and made small talk. Told stories about her current job, and Kaeden’s, about her time growing up on Pantora — she avoided public discussion of her former position in the senate and extralegal activities in public, as a rule — and asked about Kaeden’s, and recent holoshows, and the most level she was stuck on in her current game. She even seemed genuinely interested when Kaeden went down a tangent about how difficult it had been to order _anything_ out to Raada, and the lengths she’d gone to stretch the material she did have.

Kaeden won the first game, but Riyo came from behind to win the next. If Kaeden had decided to go home, as she’d planned, she felt certain Miara would have let her in. But she stayed, and they talked, and lost track of time.

Maybe it could be that simple.

On the third round — beer for Kaeden, something with vodka and fresh berries for Riyo — they’d migrated over to a booth with a tiny round table that barely had room for two drinks. The space between them had vanished with the liquid in her glass. Gathering every scrap of her courage, Kaeden asked, “What would you say to a movie night in, tomorrow? Maybe at your place, for a change.”

“My place is smaller.” Riyo said slowly, so close that Kaeden could feel the exhale of her breath on her cheek.

“But free of obnoxious sisters saying I told you so.” Miara would never let her live this down as it was. There was no need to provide her with _more_ ammunition. And a lot to be said for privacy.

She had studied Pantoran anatomy in school. This seemed like an excellent opportunity to put that knowledge to the test.

“You make a good point.” Riyo tilted her head, looking up at her from beneath her lashes.

Kaeden leaned in, and tasted berries on her lips.

_Step 9. Run into an old friend_

Kaeden was at Aldera Central Market, shopping for pie ingredients, when she ran into the clone.

Pie was romantic, right? Fresh berry pie, baked from scratch, at least? To her, the fresh berries available year-round by the carton on Alderaan were still a luxury. But Riyo had been a senator, was probably used to the sort of upscale twelve layer mousses that tasted like clouds. Would she think Kaeden was a dumb country girl if she made her _pie_?

It was a stupid worry. Especially considering Riyo’s terrible taste in cheap booze. Who _voluntarily_ drank Zirnof after the first skull crushing hangover if they could afford _anything else_? (It had taken less than a week of dating to dispel any illusion of Riyo being untouchably classy.)

But their relationship felt like it was at a turning point. The last thing Kaeden wanted was to ruin it.

Riyo was starting to hint that she might take a step back, shift towards training others in her skills. Spend more time on Alderaan than not.

(The illusion of casual dating had evaporated in the first month.)

And though having Riyo safe and home _was_ exactly what Kaeden wanted, she couldn’t help but feel that she was considering making that step back permanent only because of Kaeden. She didn’t want to take away the work Riyo believed in strongly and talked about with a wistful gleam in her eyes.

But she _also_ didn’t want to see her girlfriend on only the rare occasions her work took her to Alderaan, and spend all the time in between worrying she wouldn’t come back.

Neither seemed like a good solution. And Riyo had just moved in, as Miara prepared to finally move out.

(Another thing she was decidedly not looking forward to.)

It didn’t qualify as moving too fast if they had been dating for six months, did it?

If anyone was the Uspeeder lesbian here, it was Riyo, since she’d practically moved in before they even went on their first date. Dating her had functionally meant Riyo moved from her couch, to her bed.

She was officially being ridiculous. A few nerves about cooking for her girlfriend for the first time were natural. Kaeden had been run ragged by her residency for the entirety of their relationship, subsisting on pre-packaged meals since Riyo could not be trusted with a stove and Kix’s idea of a home cooked meal was frying protein rations.

And so Kaeden was not watching where she was going as she crossed in front of the exit to the monorail station. The toe of her less than sensible sandals caught on a raised cobblestone, sending her flying forward into a hooded, barrel chested person who might as well have been a brick wall. “Sorry!” She squeaked.

The stranger tried to push her away, but the sudden crush of people exiting the station kept them packed together as closely as two people trying to fit in the same fighter pod. “That’s all right.” They said, in a deep, strangely familiar voice.

Kaeden looked up so quickly she headbutted them in the chin.

Their hood fell slightly back, and she caught a glimpse of their — his — face. She gasped.

Kix’s shocked face looked back at her — only it wasn’t Kix at all. This clone looked half a decade older, his regulation military cut speckled liberally with salt and pepper.

The single, black number tattooed on his forehead was unmistakable.

The clone scrambled one handed for his hood, trying to step back into the shadows, and instead stepping on someone else’s foot. With a curse that would have fit right in at Selda’s, a Tholothian who might now have a broken foot departed.

Kaeden grabbed him by the sleeve, directing him out of the way of traffic. “Fives —”

“How did you —” He started to ask, interrupted by a sleepy, babbling sound.

There was a bundle of cloth on his hip she hadn’t noticed until it moved, pushing its own hood back, revealing a skull of spiked horns and wide, questioning eyes.

Kaeden blinked back. “Is that a kid?”

A clone with a Zabrak child. Her day was _really_ not going the way she’d expected.

He jerked backwards and away from her, this time running into one of the ionic columns that held up the station entryway. The child on his hip made an offended noise. “Look, I don’t know who you are, or how you know who I am, but you can’t tell anyone you’ve seen me.”

Kaeden sighed. For someone whose preferred form of rebellion was support from afar, she certainly ran into a lot of fugitives. Not a single one of them had ever had a reasonable response to anything, including the fugitive she was dating. “Are all you clones so dramatic?”

Fives flinched back against the pillar, frowning and clutching the Zabrak child close. “What did you just say? Did you know one of my brothers?”

His free hand went to a holster hidden under his robes. Fives must be new here, if he’d carried a _blaster_ into central Aldera. _No one_ carried a blaster in central Aldera, ex-GAR or no. “If you draw that, the local bots will be on you in a second. Your blaster will be confiscated, you’ll be scanned,” to send a fine and arrange a mandatory psychological evaluation, usually, but in his case, “Your name and that child will be exposed.”

Oblivious to their argument, the kid began reaching out towards her, trying to will their arm to stretch towards the berries in Kaeden’s basket.

“And the question is _do_ I.” She informed him. “Give me one reason to trust you.”

He looked her up and down, scowling. “Give _me_ one reason to trust you.”

A berry flew up and leveled off before feeding itself to the toddler.

“Shit.” Said the clone.

“That works.” Said Kaeden. She tapped on her communicator to make a call. “Hey, Kix? Yes, I know you just got out of a twelve-hour surgery, and yes, I know you have a date with that pediatrician later. This is important.” The grumbling continued, more muted. “I just ran into your brother in the market. Selda’s in thirty?”

“Kix?” The clone looked gobsmacked, like he might freeze in place and become an oddly placed lamp post.

“How did you think I recognized you?” She asked.

“You’re not an imp?” Fives raised a brow, as he looked her over doubtfully. He really must have just stepped off a transport. Imperialists existed even on Alderaan; propaganda was a powerful force. But Alderaan took pride in its current rank of third to last in per capita recruitment, with only a few hundred citizens a year leaving for the imperial academies. No self-respecting resident of Aldera City would _admit_ to associating with imperials.

Kaeden tried and failed not to be insulted. “I’m an exhausted neurology resident whose girlfriend is going to be having dinner late tonight. Kix is my friend.”

“Last I heard of him, he was branded a traitor and his file classified. He’s alive…” Fives lost his suspicious, on-edge posture for the first time and swayed as he stared off in the distance.

The doctor in her saw he wasn’t far off from passing out from exhaustion. “All right, when was the last time either of you had a decent meal? Let’s get you both to that diner I mentioned. Selda will be happy to stuff you until you pop.” She shooed him back into the station. “Don’t let him.”

Kix waved to Selda behind the counter as he entered the daytime diner, nighttime bar-slash-comedy-club run by the Raadian Twi’lek, scanning the wooden tables — real, because Alderaan had that sort of thing — for Kaeden and whatever trouble she’d picked up.

She was seated at a table with a good view of the door, but not in direct line of sight from the door, a basket overflowing with food on the ground beside her. Waving him over, Kaeden said something to a hooded human seated across from her. Strangely, there was a Zabrak child devouring Selda’s home fries, drizzled in that suspicious neon green secret sauce both Larte sisters liked so much.

“What am I missing out on an escape room date for?” He asked. Leon the heartthrob pediatrician was the most fun of any man he’d dated. Ever. Even if it couldn’t go anywhere serious, considering Leon thought his name was Kel Kitiran. But it didn’t hurt that the sex was fantastic.

The man pushed back his hood, and Kix forgot about Leon entirely.

He should have taken Kaeden literally when she said she ran into his brother.

Kix stared, his jaw wide open, as Kaeden grabbed her basket and got to her feet.

She clapped him on the shoulder. “I have a date. Call Riyo if anything goes wrong!”

He made a vague noise of agreement, his eyes never leaving the black five on his brother’s forehead.

“Kix. It really is you.” Fives exhaled heavily, shaking his head. “I didn’t believe her when she told me. On Alderaan of all places? Then again, if any of us did go and get a fancy degree, it would be you.”

“Fives.” He shook off his astonishment to clasp Fives’ hand and pull him up so they could clasp each other on the back. “You’ve gotten old.”

Fives was the younger of the two by a few batches, but he sure didn’t look it. The years hadn’t been kind, his face haggard and lined by stress. Kix would have to requisition extra doses of the anti-aging drug, now branded as LivNex, later that night.

“You haven’t.” Fives squinted at his face in confusion. “And what’s that growing out of the back of your head?” He reached behind Kix’s neck to tug on his braid.

“There’s a reason for that. I’ll tell you all about it later. But first — what is this?” He dragged his eyes away from Fives to gesture at the Zabrak in the room.

“A child. Haven’t you ever seen one before?” Fives deadpanned, entirely straight faced.

He’d missed Fives’ dumbass sense of humor almost as much as he’d missed his dumb ass.

Kix rolled his eyes. “Plenty. That doesn’t explain how you have one. You never struck me as someone who could be trusted around kids.”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t have either. She was an impulse adoption.” He sighed, picking up a napkin to wipe a spot of sauce off the kid’s chin. Unconcerned, she opened her mouth wide to chomp down on another fry. “The — they were going to kill her, like we — like all the others. I had to leave.”

All the others?

The Jedi. Was this a Jedi child? “They “could be the Inquisitors. _Darth Vader’s_ Inquisitors, if Fives hadn’t been transferred after the General stopped being the General.

Kix reached surreptitiously for the device he kept in his pocket at all times. Kanan had found that unexpectedly meeting a Jedi could re-trigger them on a mission last year, though simply thinking about Jedi didn’t have the same effect. So this was a case where asking for forgiveness was better than asking for forgiveness.

“Were you still in the same old legion?” He asked, as he flicked the Off-Switch.

“Yeah. The General, he —” Fives shook his head. He’d be hearing a ringing in his ears about now, from their testing reports. “He isn’t the same. Overnight, he— I don’t know what happened. It was like that day, but permanent.”

“I know.” Every day, he wished he didn’t. Most days, it was easy to pretend. Darth Vader was nearly always filmed with his mask on, unless his face was being used on Imperial Army recruitment propaganda. All mentions of his Jedi past had faded into memory, replaced by the Emperor’s terrifyingly handsome shadow. “I’m sorry you had to see it up close and personal.”

“There were… records. Presumed traitor. Is that true? Did you beat it somehow?” Fives leaned forward, urgent, though the event itself was years in the past.

Kix had been lucky. He’d been knocked out and rescued before he’d been forced to kill anyone. His nightmares of that day were theoretical, not memories. More often these days, they were about other parts of the war entirely, of loss, and death, but not betrayal.

Fives had not been ordered to the hanger that day, but to the Jedi Temple itself.

“Not myself, not then. But I can help you.” And without brain surgery of dubious quality, even. “Just turned off the chip that made you do it, actually.”

“What? How?” Fives, who was not familiar with rules about medical consent, was not concerned, only excited.

Kix set the Off-Switch on the table.

“That’s it?” Fives frowned, inspecting the deceptively simple device on the table.

“That’s three years of multimillion credit research, you buckethead.” Honestly, his brothers never appreciated his work enough. It was all, _I feel fine, ready to report for duty_ , when they still had holes through their biceps they couldn’t feel because they were hopped up on enough painkillers to down a bantha. Rex was a partial exception, from all the years of mechanical tinkering he’d helped out with between Skywalker and Tano, though that didn’t make him any better of a patient.

“Yeah, yeah.” Fives rolled his eyes and — ok, he got a pass for idiocy today. Because Kix had a little more of his family back. “Are you going to tell me where the hell you found the youth juice?”

“Don’t swear around the kid.” He warned, though the girl had undoubtedly heard worse from this joker. Waving Selda over for some badly needed kaf, he began to talk.

_Step 10. Learn to move on_

“Oh my god, Kaeden. I literally cannot fit anymore in my bag. The nerf-sized coat is going to have to stay.” Miara grabbed a puffy sleeve hanging out of her suitcase and pulled on it as Kaeden tried one final time to squish it down into the confines of the bag.

Since Miara had kept up her muscle mass in combat training, and Kaeden had been all to happy to let med school steal hers, Miara and the bag’s maximum capacity won. Rolling her eyes, Miara tossed the coat onto Kaeden’s head.

Spitting out a hair that had gotten nestled into the fabric from Miara’s last ski trip, Kaeden clutched the coat to her chest. “What if they send you to a frozen planet?”

“I’ll get one then?” Rolling her eyes, Miara zipped her suitcase closed, putting a conclusive end to their argument. “For now I’m going somewhere that will only get moldy. I’m not taking it.”

That was a valid reason. If she’d just _said_ that — but, technically, Kaeden wasn’t supposed to know that much. Knowing details would only put Miara in more danger, proportionate to the amount of worry Kaeden would experience by _not_ knowing.

Miara had stayed on Alderaan longer than she’d strictly had to, and Kaeden knew it was because of her. So Kaeden couldn’t rightly complain. But damn if she didn’t want to.

“I just —” She wiped at the tears beginning to fall from her eyes. “I’m proud of you. Come back to me.”

“Damn it. I wasn’t going to cry.” Miara sniffled.

Kaeden opened her arms and, miraculously, Miara walked into them, clinging with the same desperate force as she did. “I was _always_ going to cry.” She said into her sister’s hair.

When her tears had dried, Miara walked out the door with her suitcase slung over one shoulder and did not look back. Kaeden stood rooted to the spot, a stubborn part of her willing the door to open. For Miara to walk back in and say that of course it was all a joke, she would never leave. But Kaeden had had four years to adjust to the fact that Miara was determined to leave and to fight.

“Are you going to be ok?” Riyo had been waiting in their room to allow Kaeden a private goodbye with her sister, but as soon as the door shut behind Miara’s back, she emerged, rising on tiptoes to drape herself around Kaeden’s shoulders.

It would not feel real that Miara was gone for some time. She would return home, and half-expect to hear Miara immediately launching into a complaint about a co-worker in response to her greeting. But that was habit. And wishful thinking. Wishful thinking did not mean lack of acceptance.

She turned in Riyo’s arms, linking her arms around her tiny girlfriend’s waist, so she could relax against her. “Yeah, I think I am.”

Riyo searched her face for any sign she might be lying, and found none. “Do you want to get takeout and curl up on the couch to watch rom coms anyway?”

That sounded wonderful. “Yeah. Do you think that Mirialan place is open?”

Once they’d ordered, and decided on some new-to-holo-streaming film about a Naboo Queen and her favorite handmaiden, Kaeden slumped sideways on the couch, so she could lean her head on Riyo’s shoulder. Riyo took out her datapad, absently scrolling through it, as the holofilm played.

There was the initial meeting between the two women, who didn’t look nearly enough alike for realism — though that helped with the romance — where they disliked each other, until they magically worked together seamlessly on a first assignment. The takeout arrived somewhere around the time one of the other handmaidens began to get jealous. Of the queen rather than the handmaiden, which was an interesting twist. Kaeden was still eating, but Riyo had set her leftovers aside, by the time they got to the obligatory argument and dismissal, after which the handmaiden saved the queen from the assassination attempt of the fake diplomat she had been warning about.

As the queen was waiting by the bedside of her injured handmaiden, Riyo gasped, dropping her datapad to the floor with a clatter as she clapped her hands over her mouth.

“What? What happened?” Kaeden gestured for the holo to pause, as she was startled back to an upright position.

“Uh.” Riyo said, continuing to stare off into space.

“ _Riyo…_ ” She warned. Kaeden could reluctantly accept her little sister keeping secrets from her. That was what little sisters _did._ But her girlfriend knew better.

“Are you sure you want to know tonight?” Riyo asked, spreading the fingers on both hands in what he had come to realize was a conciliatory Pantoran gesture.

Now Kaeden wasn’t sure she _wanted_ to know, but she was sure she _needed_ to. “Well now I’m worried and won’t be able to stop thinking about it, so yes.”

“There’s been an internal power struggle going on in Crimson Dawn and well…” Riyo grimaced, even as her lips pulled into a smile. “A certain trade director’s assistant decided to help him out of an airlock.”

Kaeden could fill in the blanks easily enough, but she wanted Riyo to confirm it for her anyways. “This would be the same guy who kept pushing your bounty back up the list, yes?”

Riyo nodded. She looked strangely conflicted, considering how much she’d wanted this.

“Oh, _finally_.” She threw her arms around Riyo’s neck and pulled her in for a kiss. Riyo made a surprised noise, but was quick on the uptake, proceeding to make Kaeden’s head spin. Breathless, Kaeden pulled away. “Congratulations.”

“You’re… happy about this?” Riyo asked, hesitant.

Kaeden gave her another peck on the lips for good measure, because the first kiss clearly hadn’t been enough. “Obviously. It’s not like I liked you having a hundred thousand credits on your head.”

“I didn’t think you did.” Riyo ran her thumb along Kaeden’s hairline. Reflexively, she closed her eyes. “But…”

“Hey.” She said, cross at having to go over this again. “You know I’m not going to try to keep you here.”

“I know.” Riyo sighed, moving to straddle Kaeden. “But I don’t want to lose you, either.”

They were far past the point where that was possible. Homemade pie had prompted an _I love you_ on the first bite, despite how late it had been served. It hadn’t even been that good of a pie. It had just been time, combined with a hint of something new.

Change that went beyond her initial plans of trying to move up the ladder on a stable, well-off world, waiting for others to change the system was something she had only gradually learned to accept.

Kaeden had been happy, at first, at the thought of Riyo staying for her. But the longer their relationship lasted, the less comfortable she felt with that.

In helping Kix conquer clone biology, she’d spent time being a part of something, and had begun to understand why Miara craved it so badly. That sort of risk was the antithesis of what she wanted, but Kaeden had contributed, and she’d done it in her own way.

Rebellion created injuries. And therefore, the rebellion needed doctors. And it needed them accessible and beneath suspicion.

Kaeden loved living on Alderaan, but Alderaan fulfilled neither requirement.

A private, suburban clinic somewhere firmly under the Empire’s control, however…

It would give Riyo the chance to get back out there, with reconstructed identities and new routes. She’d said she was happy taking a step back — but a step back did not mean retiring. And it would be easier to train any new recruits somewhere they could be anonymous.

“Riyo?” Kaeden pulled on her girlfriend’s hips, bringing her closer, so their eyes met. “I have an idea I think you’ll like.”

When Fives dropped back into his life out of nowhere, Kix still had three months and change left of his residency.

His requirements had been cut short, given his prior intimate experience with the innards of two of the most populous species in the galaxy. But he still needed those last months. Supervision had absolutely been necessary the first time Kix tried to bind a flimsy-thin moth-like wing back together, for instance. There were infinite ways to mess things up, and the hospital was the most controlled environment he’d ever worked in. Only the paramedics and emergency room surgeons would be any use in the field, but Kix could see the appeal.

Far fewer patients died on the table than brothers had in his arms.

Rather than risk two trips from a core planet to Atollon, Kix took Fives and his mysterious charge home with him. “Nice digs,” Fives looked around Kix’s apartment with an expression of awe, though it was a standard two bedroom in an average apartment tower, personalized with blue accents and throws because Alderaanians liked their white far too much.

“It’s certainly not the barracks.” Kix said, carrying Fives’ too-small bag of belongings into the spare bedroom. Fives trailed after him, haggard, and swaying on his feet. “Get some sleep, we can talk later.”

Fives face-planted onto the bed, and immediately began snoring. The little Zabrak girl climbed up on the bed, and curled up into his side.

Kix watched them for a moment. Then, closing the door softly behind him, went to sent a request for LivNex, and whatever could be dug up of Fives’ service record.

He didn’t want to mistrust a brother. And the Fives he knew was just about the least likely of any clone to buy into the Empire’s banthashit. But he had stayed for five years, and there was far more than just Kix at risk.

Only a few hours later, he got back his results: (1) Fives had been flagged multiple times for giving his leave allowance away to discharged clones — which explained the Clone Town that Rex had found on Saleucami — (2) he was marked as a traitor up to the highest level of clearance rebel intelligence could decrypt, and (3) certain people back home were very excited to see him again.

Fives was the only member of the 501st from before Order 66 they’d found. He was trustworthy.

Still, Kix couldn’t share much with him. It was dangerous to speak about. Information spreading too far put everyone at risk. And Fives was a recent defector.

Fives understood the concept of need to know. When Fives woke up the next morning, Kix told him “We’ve got people who can handle that one’s — uh-”

He spotted the little Zabrak girl standing on the counter, using the force to pull the salt container off the top shelf, about to upend it over her head.

“Chiri, no!’ Fives scrambled after the little girl. He slid the saltshaker back onto the shelf, and picked the girl up by her legs simultaneously. He put her into a shoulder carry and dumped her, giggling, onto the couch. “Sorry, she’s a menace. We’ve been constantly on the move in part because she doesn’t get that she can’t do that in public.”

“Won’t be a problem, where we’re going.” Kix assured him.

“Some of them _did_ survive then,” Fives breathed, his eyes shining with unshed tears.

He told Fives little else. Though Fives wasn’t an idiot — he could fill in some of the blanks, easy enough — there was no chance of him suspecting the extent of the truth.

In the months that followed, Chiri had regularly destroyed his kitchen. Since Kix didn’t cook, there shouldn’t have been much to destroy. Except that Fives had, apparently, learned, because children’s growth could be stunted on ration bars and ingredients were less expensive than healthy take out. He'd had an absolute field day with Kix’s bank account since he’d arrived, experimenting with all sorts of dishes he’d come across in his travels.

Kix’s stomach thanked him, but his sleep schedule did not.

It was like having a tooka living with him — no, worse, a monkey lizard. He liked kids well enough. Babysitting had been one of his favorite jobs, before he shipped himself off to med school. But that Kix had not known what it was like to come home after a twelve-hour shift that had turned into fifteen, and find cartoons blaring while Fives attempted to patch a hole the kid had somehow managed to punch through the wall, into the next apartment.

Made it a _lot_ harder to fall into bed and pass out.

Finally, he was a fully qualified trauma surgeon for the full spectrum of common sentient vertebrate and arthropod species, and everyone back on Atollon was going to have to call him _Dr._ Kix.

They boarded a ship captained by one of Bail Organa’s most trusted guards the next day, and Kix spent the first half of the journey trying to flirt with him.

He was going to miss Alderaan. Maybe, if he survived everything to come, he would retire into the life of an ordinary doctor there.

But it was time to be back on Atollon, and Force, had be missed all of them. The Naberrie twins must have doubled in size by now, and he’d missed it.

Somewhere in an uninhabited region of the galaxy, they transferred over to a shuttle piloted by a Mandalorian Kix didn’t recognize.

And then, a few hours later, they were home.

Chiri had slept though the second half of the trip on Fives’ lap, but as they came in for the landing, she stirred, and began bouncing. Fives chuckled as he expertly avoided getting brained by the spikes on her head.

Kix hadn’t told him what to expect other than heat, so Fives was entirely unprepared when he stepped off the shuttle, and came face to face with a dead woman. With a white cloak over her armor and her towering height, she would have made a convincing specter, were it not man standing next to her, a hand on her shoulder grounding her in reality.

“Is that —? It can’t be.” Fives’ jaw dropped and he stared at her. Though she was older than Commander Tano had been when she died, far older than she would have been had she lived, Master Tano’s markings were unmistakable.

“She’s exactly who you think she is.” Kix said with a grin. Before his brain started reminding him of all the ways that wasn’t exactly true. “Sort of.” He qualified.

Tano smiled, the sharpness of it the same as when she was sixteen, despite the changes to her facial structure. “Hey, Fives.”

At the greeting, Chiri hid behind her caretaker, suddenly shy.

“ _Commander_. Captain. Um.” Fives stumbled over his words, still gaping.

Fives saluted, but Rex put an end to that quickly enough, grabbing each of them with one hand, pulling them into a rough bear hug. Kix hugged him back, just as bone-crushingly tight. The sound of Tano’s laughter as she avoided being pulled in washed over him, and the galaxy was just a little more right.

Kix had told himself _you can’t save everyone_ like a mantra from the moment he witnessed his first brother die on the field. But he had never really believed it. That was what had sent him off to Alderaan in the first place, the idea that he should be able to do more. A large part of him had expected to fail. Yet Kix had succeeded in ways far beyond what he’d expected. But he hadn’t done it alone. Now, he got to come back, bringing his new achievements and skills with him.

He would never have all of his brothers by his side again. But he could help those he could find. And he could live the years that now stretched out before him as best he could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This should be by far the longest chapter. I hope, for my sake. 
> 
> Next time: the working title was "Kanan needs therapy" but it ended up being much more lighthearted. So it’s mostly just Kanan, making the sort of decisions we all do at nineteen. But with more explosives.


End file.
